Toronto city council voted to overhaul the TTC board on Monday recommending the group be dissolved and replaced with one that includes members of the public, while Karen Stintz was re-elected as TTC chair.
The new structure will see an 11-member board that includes four civilians and seven city councillors.
Stintz, the councillor for Eglinton-Lawrence, had recommended late last week to replace the current commission with the new composition. Councillors voted 29-15 in favour of the plan.
Stintz said the appointment of the new members sends a message to the province that there is stability once again.
"Now the province knows that we have a stable commission for the next two years," Stintz told reporters. "The mayor has accepted that council makes decisions, and now the commission is in line with the will of council."
Elected to the board were councillors Raymond Cho, Sintz, John Parker, Maria Augimeri, Glenn De baeremaeker., Josh Colle, and Peter Milczyn.
While the seven councillors elected will begin immediately, the citizen members will be appointed by council by Oct. 30 for a four-year term. A vice-chair will also be appointed by the commission among the four citizens.
Mayor Rob Ford and his brother Coun. Doug Ford had been backing an alternative plan to replace the current TTC board with a panel of five civilians and four city councillors.
Coun. Michael Thompson also recommended dissolving the commission and replacing it with one made up entirely of nine civilians.
"Now we have handed over our commission to a group of left-leaning politicians who will most likely try to adopt a policy that brings LRTs and not subways into the city," Coun. Giorgio Mammoliti told CP24 after the vote.
"Some of them have sold their souls to the NDP – to the left – and now they have got to live with them for the next three years. I hope them the best."
Earlier Coun. Denzil Minnan-Wong, who said supported the five-citizen-four-councillor split, said the public wants "less politics, more progress."
"The public wants to take the politics out of transit. They are fed up with the fights that we are having at city hall and putting more politicians on the commission is a step in the wrong direction in my view and not a step in the right direction," said Minnan-Wong.
Last month the TTC board voted 5-4 to relieve TTC general manager Gary Webster of his duties amid a political battle over the city's transit future.
The Mayor's allies claim this in retaliation to the dismissal of Webster two weeks ago and say it is a step in the wrong direction.
With reporting by CTV Toronto's Colin D'Mello
