Gordon Joseph Chong (October 28, 1943 – July 13, 2018) was a Canadian politician and public servant active in

Toronto Toronto ( , locally pronounced or ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most populous city in Canada. It is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a p ...

. He served as a

Toronto city councillor Toronto City Council is the governing body of the municipal government of Toronto, Ontario. Meeting at Toronto City Hall, it comprises 25 city councillors and the mayor of Toronto. The Toronto City Council 2022–2026, current term began on Nove ...

and was vice-chairman of the

Toronto Transit Commission The Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) is the primary public transport agency in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, operating the majority of the city's transit bus, bus and rail services. It is the oldest and largest of the urban transit service providers ...

in the 1990s. He served on the board of

GO Transit GO Transit is a regional public transit system serving the Greater Golden Horseshoe region of Ontario, Canada. With its hub at Union Station in Toronto, GO Transit's green-and-white trains and buses serve a population of more than seven mil ...

from 2000 to 2006 including periods as vice-chairman of GO Transit and chairman. He was also the final chair of the Greater Toronto Services Board (2001).

Career

A dentist by profession (formerly with Yorkville Dental Associates), and a founding director of the Federation of Chinese-Canadian Professionals, Chong was encouraged to enter municipal politics by Metro Chairman

Paul Godfrey Paul Victor Godfrey, CM, OOnt (born January 12, 1939) is a businessman and former Canadian politician. During his career, Godfrey was a North York alderman, Chairman of Metro Toronto, President of the ''Toronto Sun'' and head of the Toronto B ...

, whom he met at a block party, and represented downtown Toronto's Ward 6 (which included the Financial District, University of Toronto, and Chinatown) on both Metro Council and

Toronto City Council Toronto City Council is the governing body of the municipal government of Toronto, Ontario. Meeting at Toronto City Hall, it comprises 25 city councillors and the mayor of Toronto. The Toronto City Council 2022–2026, current term began on Nove ...

from 1980 until the 1982 election when he was defeated in the two-councillor ward by former mayor

John Sewell John Sewell (born December 8, 1940) is a Canadian politician and lawyer who served as the 58th mayor of Toronto from 1978 to 1980. Background Born and raised in the Beach neighbourhood, in Toronto, Sewell attended Malvern Collegiate Institute ...

and newcomer

Jack Layton John Gilbert Layton (July 18, 1950 – August 22, 2011) was a Canadian politician and academic who served as the leader of the New Democratic Party (NDP) from 2003 to 2011 and leader of the Official Opposition in 2011. He previously sat on T ...

. Chong returned to dentistry but in 1994 returned to

Metro Toronto Council The Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto was an upper-tier level of municipal government in Ontario, Canada, from 1953 to 1998. It was made up of the old city of Toronto and numerous townships, towns and villages that surrounded Toronto, whic ...

as Metro Councillor (and Toronto City Councillor from 1997 onwards) for Ward 11 Don Parkway, in suburban

North York North York is a former township and city and is now one of the six administrative districts of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is located in the northern area of Toronto, centred around Yonge Street, north of Ontario Highway 401. It is bounded by ...

, until 2000 when he retired from electoral politics and became the founding chairman of the province's Social Housing Services Corporation. At various times in his municipal career, Chong also served as chairman of the Metro Toronto Housing Authority and as a member of the

Toronto Police Services Board The Toronto Police Service Board (TPSB) is the civilian police board that governs the Toronto Police Service (TPS). The board is responsible for approving the annual police budget, defining objectives and policies for TPS, and hiring Toronto's p ...

. In the 1987 provincial election, Chong was a Progressive Conservative candidate in York Mills, losing by 3,000 votes to Liberal Brad Nixon. In 2010 he served as a part of new mayor

Rob Ford Robert Bruce Ford (May 28, 1969 – March 22, 2016) was a Canadian politician and businessman who served as the 64th mayor of Toronto from 2010 to 2014. Before and after his term as mayor, Ford was a city councillor representing Ward 2 Etobi ...

's transition team. In 2011, he was appointed to head up the Toronto Transit Commission’s consulting subsidiary at a $100,000 yearly salary, raising controversy about Ford's recruitment and hiring practices. His recommendations for road tolls or a

congestion charge Congestion pricing or congestion charges is a system of surcharging users of public goods that are subject to congestion through excess demand, such as through higher peak charges for use of bus services, electricity, metros, railways, tel ...

to pay for an extension to the Sheppard subway were rejected. Chong later endorsed the construction of a Sheppard East LRT instead of a subway. Chong had also been involved with the Toronto Head Tax Action Committee, a group, a group which lobbied for an official apology and redress for the head tax imposed on Chinese migrants to Canada from 1885 to 1923. He also served as chair of the board of the

YMCA YMCA, sometimes regionally called the Y, is a worldwide youth organisation based in Geneva, Switzerland, with more than 64 million beneficiaries in 120 countries. It has nearly 90,000 staff, some 920,000 volunteers and 12,000 branches w ...

of Greater Toronto and served as a

citizenship judge The Citizenship Commission is an administrative tribunal within Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC). The overall mandate of the Commission is to assess referred applications to ensure they meet the physical-presence requirements ...

. Chong was a ''

Toronto Sun The ''Toronto Sun'' is an English-language tabloid format, tabloid newspaper published daily in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The newspaper is one of several ''Sun'' tabloids published by Postmedia Network. The newspaper's offices are located at Pos ...

'' columnist at the time of his death and had previously written a column for the ''

Toronto Star The ''Toronto Star'' is a Canadian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper. It is owned by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary of Torstar Corporation and part of Torstar's Daily News Brands (Torstar), Daily News Brands division. ...

'' and op-ed pieces for the ''

National Post The ''National Post'' is a Canadian English-language broadsheet newspaper and the flagship publication of the American-owned Postmedia Network. It is published Mondays through Saturdays, with Monday released as a digital e-edition only.

''.

Personal life

Chong was born on October 28, 1943 in Toronto to a Chinese father, Joseph Chong, and white mother of British ancestry whose family disowned her when she married a Chinese man. He grew up in the city's original

Chinatown Chinatown ( zh, t=唐人街) is the catch-all name for an ethnic enclave of Chinese people located outside Greater China, most often in an urban setting. Areas known as "Chinatown" exist throughout the world, including Europe, Asia, Africa, O ...

around Elizabeth Street and Dundas Street. He died at the age of 74 in

palliative care Palliative care (from Latin root "to cloak") is an interdisciplinary medical care-giving approach aimed at optimizing quality of life and mitigating or reducing suffering among people with serious, complex, and often terminal illnesses. Man ...

after having suffered from a heart condition for several years. He was married to civil servant Shirley Hoy, who had been his partner since the late 1990s, and he was previously married to Lorinne Matsui for 31 years.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Chong, Gordon 1943 births 2018 deaths Metropolitan Toronto councillors Canadian people of Chinese descent Toronto city councillors University of Toronto alumni 20th-century Canadian dentists 20th-century Canadian municipal councillors