About this series
The Globe is reporting from cities and towns in Ontario, Manitoba and British Columbia to hear from residents about the issues affecting their communities and their votes in the municipal elections. Explore the entire series here.
Oakwood Drive is a long residential street that cars, e-bikes and scooters treat like a raceway, annoying residents and making it a treacherous place to walk or stand by the roadside.
It’s the kind of thing that Abdullah Mir, a candidate for the Ward 1 city council seat in Monday’s municipal election, describes as an ordinary, “unsexy” problem that city governments deal with all the time.
But in Pickering the basics of local government have lately taken a back seat. Over the last four years city council has been a raucous arena where divisive hot-button issues have sucked the air out of civic governance. Misconduct has become an issue of growing concern for local government in a number of cities and towns and people are looking for solutions.
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The mood at Pickering City Hall has been fraught recently: A 2024 city bulletin described ‘unruly, disruptive, and intimidating behaviours from visitors.’
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Abdullah Mir is running to represent Ward 1 in this year’s municipal election.
In Pickering, the seven-member council has been wrapped up in the controversy surrounding outgoing Ward 1 city councillor, Lisa Robinson, first elected in 2022. Ms. Robinson is running for mayor this time in an attempt to unseat incumbent Kevin Ashe. She was a Conservative candidate in the 2021 federal election, but was dumped by the party after inflammatory and Islamophobic tweets surfaced, which at the time she denied writing.
Ms. Robinson, who did not respond to messages from The Globe and Mail, was the subject of nine reports by the city’s integrity commissioner during the last council term and was docked 90-days pay several times for actions that included maligning staff.
She has defended herself in the past by saying she is neither racist nor homophobic and that she is fighting an establishment at City Hall that’s protecting its own interests. She says government should be open, councillors shouldn’t be expected to fall in line and residents shouldn’t be dismissed as interruptions.
“They call me disruptive. I am disruptive because City Hall needs disrupting,” Ms. Robinson says on her campaign website. “Every sanction, every statement, every attempt to isolate me has made one thing clear: I cannot be controlled by the current establishment.”
She attracted a loyal following to council meetings who cheered her on as she opposed things like Pride flags and gender neutral washrooms, railed against what she called attempts to silence her and even accused colleagues of corruption. The atmosphere deteriorated to the point that council stopped holding meetings in person, due to “unruly, disruptive, and intimidating behaviours from visitors,” according to a 2024 city bulletin.
How a level of government normally preoccupied with potholes and parks became a vicious battleground is bewildering to many residents, Mr. Mir included.
“The last four years have been a massive distraction because of all the nonsense,” Mr. Mir says. “I’m looking to put all that behind us.”
Between Pickering and Rouge National Urban Park is the Duffins Rouge Agricultural Preserve, which Mr. Mir fought to preserve when the Ford government carved out pieces of the Greenbelt in 2022. The province reinstated protections after pressure from Stop Sprawl Durham, which Mr. Mir belongs to.
Pickering is a bedroom community of more than 100,000 people at Toronto’s eastern edge.
With a waterfront to the south, forests and farmlands to the north and a short commute to the country’s largest economic hub, the province’s growth plan calls for it to double in size in the next 25 years.
Mr. Mir, 33, lives in the community with his parents, who came to Canada from Pakistan. He saved up two years of holidays at his federal civil service job, managing a team at the Department of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship, to run for office.
He says he’s running because he wants to see the area grow in a productive and responsible way.
“A lot of the things that people want here are similar across political lines,” Mr. Mir says. “A good city is one where we have good parks and good roads and good libraries and good snow clearing.”
He’s delighted to talk about his time leading an organization that opposes sprawl in Pickering, and how it kept parts of the Greenbelt out of the hands of developers, or his time on the library board, where he pushed for a local bookmobile. He does not want to talk much about Ms. Robinson.
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Road safety is a common complaint in the ward where Mr. Mir is running.
On the campaign trail, Mr. Mir encounters voters who want reassurance that, if elected, he would be a different kind of councillor.
Nancy Ronchin, a volunteer canvasser for Mr. Mir, comes down Oakwood Drive for a debrief with the candidate. She tells him that residents are complaining about drivers acting as though this is Highway 407 and many have mentioned Ms. Robinson.
As one resident puts it, he wants a local representative who can disagree without descending to hostility.
Ms. Ronchin says she has never been involved in politics and didn’t know Mr. Mir until recently, but she made up her mind that she had to do something.
She was particularly upset about a fight over a gender-neutral washroom at a local recreation centre, which she says is useful but that Ms. Robinson opposes.
“I can’t just complain about it from my couch,” Ms. Ronchin says.
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The city hall in Whitby, east of Pickering, has also had challenges with uncivil behaviour, hence the police at this April council meeting.Sammy Kogan/The Globe and Mail
Conflict that extends to incivility has affected other local governments and put pressure on provinces to step in.
In neighbouring Whitby, Ont., which borders Pickering to the east, a councillor was docked pay earlier this year for maligning city staff and eroding public trust. In Sarnia, Ont., a local councillor has been investigated by the integrity commissioner and banned from attending council meetings in person. And in Kamloops, there have been lawsuits and investigations spawning from a dispute between the mayor and city council.
Partly in response to these concerns, Ontario passed a Municipal Accountability Act in May that gives councils the ability to remove from office those who’ve committed serious transgressions. B.C. introduced a bill in April to standardize codes of conduct that wasn’t passed before the provincial election was called.
Back in Pickering, Mara Nagy, councillor for Ward 2, says the last term on council has been difficult. She describes herself as one of many who opposed Ms. Robinson’s ideas and rhetoric. She felt frustrated by chaotic meetings that sometimes went on for five or six hours, she says.
“There were a couple meetings where we actually had to pause to leave the chambers because it was ready to turn into a riot.”
“If you tell the whole story, it sounds unbelievable that something like this could happen in what is, for all intents and purposes, a suburb.”
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Mr. Mir says that, if elected, he’d advocate for the reopening of this bridge to Toronto, closed since 2024 because of safety concerns.
As he ends his day of campaigning, Mr. Mir ushers a reporter away from the roadside for safety. He says Pickering can be the best of both worlds, a place close to nature and the waterfront, that is near the city but offers something different. It can grow into something great over the next generation, he says. But someone needs to mind the parks and potholes and scrutinize the planning.
Looking at the stretch of road as another vehicle speeds past, he’s hit with a burst of enthusiasm for traffic controls. Maybe there should be a speed bump, or a chicane – he’d consult with residents, of course, but something can be done.
“This is what we need to be fixing. Not arguing about who’s using what bathroom,” Mr. Mir says.
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