Whatever political taste it leaves in your mouth — whether you love it or hate it — Premier Doug Ford’s unceremonious downsizing of Toronto City Council left the city with the most daunting of deadlines: a last-minute technical challenge to adapt to a shrunken election map and execute a successful vote, almost in real time.As the polling wound down late Monday, the entire city could bask at least in this one pleasant surprise — Toronto pulled it off. More specifically, Toronto city clerk Ulli Watkiss and her team pulled it off. What is normally a thankless task for Canadians accustomed to routinely trouble-free elections was this time a very big ask — one that Watkiss herself warned council in mid-September was at a technical “tipping point,” with preparations for the vote in doubt.For the first few nerve-wracking minutes Monday, glitches seemed to abound, with multiple reports of delays and malfunctions at polling locations around the city. But the city soon found workarounds and by midday almost all voter frustrations had vanished. Late Monday afternoon the city’s senior spokesperson delivered a telling verdict via email, declaring “smooth operations.” You could almost feel the relief pouring off those two emailed words.Read more:School trustees are spending your billions. Maybe you should vote for themTen (not at all) tough questions for Toronto’s mayoral contendersBallot points: your questions answered about voting in Toronto’s electionThe city clerk’s team, which is responsible for administering the election and ensuring its integrity and fairness, met the first of the deadlines, starting with advance voting on Oct. 10.Behind the scenes, this involved abandoning eight months of planning for an anticipated 47-ward election and instead shifting quickly to the new, provincially mandated 25-seat format. The technical ripple-effect left the clerk’s staff scrambling to redo pollin ...
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