Joyce Zuk

"If you can't chair the meeting according to the rules then step aside for a councillor who will!"

That was the defining moment for me about Councillor Joyce Zuk. When she confronted the all-powerful Mayor, Mike Hurst, and told him exactly what she thought of him! I remember being at Council when she said that. There was an audible gasp in the Council Chamber. Someone standing up to Hurst and in public. Unheard of! It was all part of the border fight that pitted the majority of Council aginst the Mayor and Joyce was there scrapping for her constituents.

I was shocked frankly that Joyce was not going to run again. Oh I had heard that rumour so many times before. I knew that she wanted to be Mayor one day. It was the same thing before the last election. But this time it was true. I wondered what changed this time although I had heard some reasons.

Mentally tough, with a sharp mind, she seemed to me to be the quickest on Council to figure out what to do with an issue, especially the difficult ones. Ever so often, you could see her snap at her colleagues when they took so long to do the obvious.

But it was not the same Joyce in the second term as in the first. [BLOG December 10, 2005 The Scorecard] She seemed too determined to be nice. She lost her edge I believe. That was not why I voted for her!

You'd think it would have been easier for her with the other women on Council. She played the "mother hen" for them at first, helping them get around and learn the ropes, something she did not have when she was first elected. Instead, she seemed much more tense, uncomfortable in the second term. To be honest, to me, there was not the fire in her that there was the first time around. She just seemed under so much pressure.

She was hurt badly by the border file. Yet, she was one of seven Councillors who saved the City from disaster in her first term. The vast majority of the Ward supported her position--I was shocked at how strong her electoral support was when she was re-elected. It demonstrated to me that she was a fighter who ran a great campaign. But the personal animosity directed to her by certain segments of her electorate was shocking. She was threatened and harassed. I personally witnessed a person at a meeting rip up a piece of paper and throw it in Joyce's face because Joyce took a position that the resident did not like! I saw the hate mail. After awhile, you have to wonder if it's really worth the aggrevation.

While publicly she supported the unity of Council, behind closed doors it was different. Her relationship with her Wardmate, Councilor Brister, was horrible from what I heard. [BLOG January 16, 2006 Ward 1 Showdown At The Council Corral] In fact, their relationship was so bad I was told that they had difficulty in agreeing on which projects to spend Ward money. I am sure that spending 4 more years with Councillor Brister, assuming he was to be re-elected, was not something that was on the top of her list as something she was looking forward to do.

Council itself was not all that pleasant. She was viewed as one of the group of "spenders." She played Santa Claus to her Wardmate's Scrooge and did not care. That is not something that wins you friends when the mantra is "fiscal repsonsibility." In Gord's report card, she fell from a B+ to a D+ in only one year. (In some circles, that is a badge of honour these days!)

She had to support a failed Schwartz Report even when she knew it would not work. She pretended that Council worked together when she knew there was no leadership. I think she also got tired of being undercut on matters in which she had responsibility, as with Transit Windsor as an example.

It should be interesting with Joyce on Council for the next few months. She may not care any more to put up the facade of niceness any more. She will undoubtedly speak her mind and be much more vocal. I am not sure that I would want to be the Mayor or her Wardmate either if she gets angry at something

Is this the end of Joyce politically in Windsor? Nawwwwwww. My best guess: when Sandra Pupatello decides to leave to join her husband in Newfoundland, her seat will be open. Who will be asked to run---the former Ward 1 Councillor. She will have left Council a winner, a nice position to be in when she runs for the nomination!