March 23rd, 2008
‘City’s loss is TTC’s gain’
By Adam Chaleff-Freudenthaler // 4 Comments
Brad Ross has been the City of Toronto's clear, concise and witty mouthpiece for several years and he'll soon be moving onward and upward. Beginning in April, the TTC will be the beneficiary of Ross's services as he becomes, what I'm told is, the first director of communications in the history of the Commission.
Being a spokesperson can be one of the toughest jobs around and ends up with many a communicator under the proverbial bus. At the City of Toronto the likelihood of that rises considerably because of the number of media outlets and a less than streamlined political culture. As a testament to his abilities, Ross is moving on on a high note and with the praise of the mayor's deputy communications director, and former press gallery scribe, Stuart Green to boot:
“(The City's) loss is the TTC's gain. Brad is an exceptional communicator with vision and smarts to back up his words. In his role as spokesperson for the city, he was able to clearly and articulately convey a message in a way that was informative to Torontonians. His commitment to his job is without question. We wish him the best of luck in his new position and look forward to working with him in on building a great city with an exceptional public transit system.â€
Who ever takes over as the City's primary spokesperson will have big shoes to fill.
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Irish Rail has a director of communications called Barry Kenny who regularly goes on the talk shows against transit advocates with his talking points and stonewalls when confronted with the overcrowded services his employer runs. Here's a link to some podcasts of media interviews on which "Comical Barry" regularly pops up on as the IR rep.
Let's hope Brad Ross doesn't go completely native and is a straight shooter when it comes to relaying the facts rather than dumping down a smokescreen to cover the Commission's ass every time something bad happens. Issues like the TTC's scorched earth "remodelling" of the subway system, the extension of the OneStop contract and the botched track project at Fleet Street are in dire need to a proper explanation to taxpayers.
How much is he going to make for becoming Adam Giambrone's Information Minister? Marilyn Bolton makes $101k, apparently, so presumably more given his spiffy title.
About time. The TTC does a horrendous job of communications. They spit ball with the media (ferries from Scarborough anyone?) and roll out ideas in public in such a fashion that what might be good ideas get pilloried in the media and are dead in the water when they weren't anywhere near ready for implementation anyway.
It's entirely likely that he'll just become a PR guy for their hijinks, but here's hoping he has the good sense to push back a little internally and say, 'maybe we should hold off on talking to the media about our idea to relieve subway congestion by catapulting commuters downtown until we've got some political and financial buy-in, huh guys?'
Mark> you sound a little sceptical here
I've long said that Marilyn Bolton has the most thankless job in the City. Will she be staying on?
Comment by Jonathan Goldsbie
March 23, 2008 | 1:21 pm