Toronto’s mayor recommends stadium be renamed to honour Rob Ford

TORONTO – The mayor of Toronto is recommending that a stadium be named after his infamous predecessor — the late Rob Ford.

In a letter to council, John Tory calls for the renaming of a stadium at Centennial Park, in the city’s west end, to Rob Ford Memorial Stadium.

Tory notes that Ford, who was a lifelong west-end resident, became known for his “unique approach to public service” after being elected to city council in November 2000 and he carried it on after being elected mayor in 2010.

But he says Ford’s community involvement went well beyond politics, and his passion for football led him to found the Newtonbrook North Stars in 1999 and a highly successful football program at Don Bosco Catholic Secondary School in 2002. He also established the Rob Ford Football Foundation, a program that helps fund football programs in high schools across the city.

Tory says it would be fitting, in light of Ford’s many years of work on football programs, to rename a football stadium to honour Ford, who died in March 2016 from a rare and aggressive form of cancer.

Ford became a certified celebrity in light of his admitted crack cocaine use, alcohol abuse, lewd comments and at times outrageous behaviour that transformed his mayoral office into an unprecedented spectacle.

Ford, whose clarion call was “time to stop the gravy train,” died at age 46, 18 months after a cancer diagnosis scuttled his bid for a second term as mayor, although he easily won election as a councillor in his west-end ward.

Tory also is recommending council honour two other city council members who have died recently — deputy mayor Pam McConnell, and Coun. Ron Moeser.

In consultation with the McConnell and Moeser families, Tory said he would convene panels of councillors and community members in order to determine suitable public properties that could be renamed in their memory.