DEAD WATER |
It was widely expected that the decision to stop fluoridation would be made by the Toronto City Council in view of the fact that the city is experiencing a serious financial crisis.
The financial difficulties of the city of Toronto have been in the news for quite some time already. The reason for that is quite obvious, in my opinion. While the tax base is rapidly shrinking because of loss of manufacturing jobs, this is not reflected in the salaries of city staff, which is probably the only "growth industry" in the Greater Toronto Area.
Tool and die industry is as good as dead here, and so is mold-making industry, with all business going to China, which can make molds or dies for 8-15% of what it would cost to have it made here.
And so, many people, who used to make good money, had to settle for a fraction of their old income on a new job, if they could find it, of course.
Here is an illustration of discrepancy between salaries in the private and public sectors:
In 1988 one acquaintance have got a job with a certain city "hydro", a company, which sells electricity to individual consumers - from companies to households. They, in turn, buy it from Ontario Hydro, a Provincial corporation.
For all practical purposes both are a part of a government (Provincial and municipal). They are owned by the government, all appointments are done by the government, everybody is paid by the government.
And so that place had information booth in the lobby, with a man and a woman sitting there. Each one was making 59 thousand dollars.
As a comparison, a president of Raytheon Canada (in Waterloo), with the staff of some 300 was making 70 thousand.
I was working as a contractor for Raytheon at that time. They were making plenty of sophisticated stuff - electronics for Patriot missile, electronics for the navy.
At that time they were busy with an order from the Dutch navy, over a dozen racks full of electronics for each ship.
There was also a device for US navy, which had a 7-layer printed circuit board and the first in the world LCD panel, which had over a thousand contacts, all solderless!
It is a Raytheon factory, which gets orders from other Raytheon divisions, in particular the Submarine Signal Division in Portsmouth RI, Missile Systems Division in Andover, MA, plus others.
And so the president of that place was making 70 thousand in the late 80s - earyl 90s.
As a contrast, if you look through the numerous pages of the salary disclosure website of the Ministry of Finance of the Province of Ontario, you would see that almost anyone with "manager" in his title in the hospital system or in other branches of government makes 150 thousand.
It is a very educational reading, I strongly recommend it to everybody! Just do a search for "salary disclosure" at Google.ca or some other search engine, which covers Canada.
Exactly the same "arithmetic" applies to other branches of government, including municipal. A janitor with a School Board can easily make THREE times of what a janitor at some private company can hope to make.
It is certainly no surprise that the city of Toronto is in serious financial difficulties!
And so there were many drastic proposals to reduce expenses, including nothing less than mothballing an entire section of a subway, as well as some very "innovative" taxation schemes, in particular "land transfer tax", "vehicle registration tax", plus some others.
Practically all swimming pools are going to be closed!
And yet there seems to be no shortage of money when it comes to adding rat poison to our drinking water!
I find it truly amazing!
In case there are no people in City Hall who can put it all in writing, I decided to volunteer my effort to write a sample letter on this subject.
Mister Mayor, you are welcome to use it free of charge!
(Mayors of other fluoridated municipalities, who are considering saving money by putting an end to fluoridation, are also welcome to use it)
Dear fellow Torontonians:
In these difficult times, when our city is experiencing very serious financial problems, we at City Hall have to make many difficult decisions to save money.
We have already drastically cut services in many areas, but now we have no choice but to go even further.
What I am about to tell you is truly heartbreaking! I am sure you would feel the same way when you hear it - we can no longer afford adding rat poison to our drinking water.
Several decades ago, when this program was still being implemented, the Toronto City council had made a decision not to waste money on pharmaceutical grade rat poison, but to use instead the unprocessed industrial waste, which comes directly from the wet scrubbers of smelters and pesticide plants accross US and Canada.
The subsequent city governments had carried on with that wise decision, which allows us to kill two birds with the same stone - we are getting it cheaper, and we are also not missing out on such wonderful supplements as mercury, lead, arsenic, cadmium, many other heavy metals, as well as pesticide residue.
But now, my fellow Torontonians, we have no choice, but to put an end to this practice. This city simply has no money to carry on with it.
I took it upon myself to break this hard news to you, there is simply nobody else in City Hall who had enough courage to do it.
Those of you who cannot imagine drinking water without rat poison in it, can buy rat poison in a hardware store. Just remember to use in moderation.
I thank you for your understanding and God bless!