Crazy Town: The Rob Ford Story (24 page)

An intoxicated Mayor Rob Ford greets other St. Patrick’s Day revellers on his way to the Bier Markt bar in downtown Toronto in 2012. Courtesy of Jennifer Gordon.

Mayor Rob Ford’s high school football team, the Don Bosco Eagles, wins the semi-final match. They would go on to compete in the Metro Bowl. November 21, 2012. © Richard Lautens/
Toronto Star.

Rob Ford poses with Anthony Smith, Monir Kassim, and Muhammad Khattak in front of an alleged crack house at 15 Windsor Road. The
Star
was given this photo by the men trying to sell a video of the mayor smoking what looked like crack cocaine. Early 2013.

Kevin Donovan and I (Kevin is in the back seat) meet with Mohamed Farah to watch footage of the so-called crack video. May 3, 2013. © Dale Brazao/
Toronto Star
.

Mayor Rob Ford and Alexander “Sandro” Lisi (far right), his friend and occasional driver, at a Toronto Maple Leafs game. May 8, 2013. © Joe Warmington/
Toronto Sun
.

Investigative reporter Kevin Donovan defends the
Toronto Star
’s coverage of the so-called crack video at the Ontario Press Council. September 9, 2013. © Colin McConnell/
Toronto Star
.

Chief Bill Blair announces that the Toronto Police Service has recovered the video of Rob Ford appearing to smoke crack cocaine. October 31, 2013. © Andrew Francis Wallace/
Toronto Star
.

After the mayor admitted to smoking crack cocaine, his sister, Kathy Ford, and mother, Diane Ford, sit down with CP24 news to defend him. November 7, 2013. © CP24.

Mayor Rob Ford drags his wife, Renata, through a throng of reporters after apologizing for making vulgar comments. November 14, 2013. © Steve Russell/
Toronto Star
.

City councillors turn their backs to Mayor Rob Ford after he refuses to step down. November 14, 2013. © Mark Blinch/REUTERS.

TEN

PATHOLOGICAL

LIARS

I
spent the night trapped on the edge of sleep, my restless brain refusing to be quiet. Every conversation I’d had over the past year, every story I’d written, everything I’d seen—it was all cycling through my mind at high speed on repeat. Now and again, exhaustion would take over and I’d start to drift off, but then the memories would become so vivid I’d jolt awake to ask a question. At 5:45
A.M.
, I figured I had been in bed long enough and put on a pot of coffee. The story would be online soon. Sitting at my computer, I heard the paper hit the carpet in the hallway outside my condo. A gentle bump—the culmination of a year’s work. I ran to the door. The smell of ink made it real.

I spread the paper out on my dining room table and stared at the story, letting reality sink in. “‘Intoxicated’ Ford Asked to Leave Gala,” by Robyn Doolittle and Kevin Donovan.

We had published a story saying the mayor of Toronto needed to go to rehab, according to his own staff. We had revealed that he’d been booted from a military charity ball for showing up impaired, and that those closest to him thought his drinking was affecting his job. Our story was explosive. Things
were going to be different—for the mayor, for the city, for the
Star
, and for me.

Rob Ford’s time as mayor could now be divided into two periods: before the Garrison Ball story and after. Until that morning, a huge piece of background had been missing from City Hall coverage. Why had the Ford administration lost control of council? Because the mayor was not around to steer the ship. So where was Ford? Struggling with alcohol, according to his own staff. Clues that something was wrong had been out there for a year, through sightings of Ford posted on Twitter, rumblings in the police community, and whispers in the corridors of City Hall. But before the Garrison Ball story, the public had never been let in on the secret. It was a tricky situation. Something like the bachelorette party run-in would come up, but reporters hadn’t been able to write the story. Doing so would have required raising serious questions about the mayor’s personal life, questions too sensitive to hinge on one unflattering photo.

As I sat sipping my coffee, I thought about how our investigation could pave the way for a more honest conversation on what was happening in our municipal government. As a journalist, it’s always a difficult decision to report on an elected official’s personal life. There has to be an overriding public interest—if someone’s ability to do their job properly has been compromised, for example. This clearly seemed to be the case with Rob Ford, and until that Tuesday morning, no one outside the City Hall bubble was talking about it. It was a conversation Toronto deserved to be in on.

Kevin Donovan and I had interviews booked all day. When newspapers print a controversial story, reporters and publishers have to defend it, answer questions, and be accountable to the
public. We knew we were going to take heat for the number of anonymous sources in the piece. But the key detail in our story—that the mayor was asked to leave a military ball—had a very credible name attached to it, Councillor Paul Ainslie. We had a pattern we could point to: the drunken tirade at the Maple Leafs game, the domestic incidents involving calls to the police, the photos on social media, a named woman who saw the mayor “inebriated” before entering the Bier Markt, as well as our five well-vetted confidential sources. And Ford’s staff believed he needed to be in rehab. This was a matter of huge public interest.