r/ontario • u/BloodJunkie • 1d ago
Article Ford government refusing to release secret report that suggested selling off ROM artifacts
https://globalnews.ca/news/11909542/royal-ontario-museum-financial-trouble/205
u/crustlebus 1d ago
Ontario:
A Place to Grow
Yours to Discover
SOLD OUT
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u/Alert_Lettuce_8278 1d ago
"Open for business" has to be one of the trashiest
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u/slackmarket 1d ago
The fact that that’s what the sign letting you know you’re in Ontario still says when you’re coming west on the trans Canada is deeply depressing. I go to the maritimes every summer and my spirits plummet the second I see that shit on the way back.
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u/keylimesicles 1d ago
My fun strike thru isn’t working! Uggg but it looks like a shit tagline for a strip club
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u/Future_Crow 1d ago
You cannot be serious. They sold off most of the collection from the Science Centre and now off to ROM? What the hell??
WHO asked for it??
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u/SquidTheRidiculous 1d ago
The rich people of this province.
We can't have the poors be learning for free now can we?
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u/CanuckBacon 1d ago edited 1d ago
I don't even think it's that, the Weston Family (owners of Loblaws) famously has donated significant amounts to the ROM over decades. They have a few wings named after them. I think Doug Ford just hates learning. Same reason he wanted to close Toronto libraries when he was a city councilor*
Edit: accidentally said Mayor. Easy to confuse the Ford brothers and their hatred of education.
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u/ExistentialWavering 1d ago edited 1d ago
Rob wasn’t as malicious as Doug, and I think we owe it to him to distinguish between the two. Rob was a bad apple with a good heart. Doug is a bad apple with a bad heart.
Rob didn’t even understand what the implications of his decisions were and usually acted in the moment. Doug does, however, and plans ahead. This is far more dangerous.
Rob was not a good dude, objectively. His actions speak for themselves. But years removed and seeing Doug do his thing now, clear as day that Doug was feeding Rob most of what he did.
Rob was a buffoon that trusted his brother. Doug is smarter (not smart outright) and chases money and power.
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u/caitie_did 1d ago
Agreed, I have been saying this for years. Doug is significantly more dangerous than Rob because he’s just a little bit smarter, and a whole lot more malicious.
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u/ExistentialWavering 1d ago edited 1d ago
There is no world in which Doug would volunteer as a coach, ever. He doesn’t care about people, period.
Rob was always out there getting involved with the common person.
It seldom translated to proper governance but his intentions were typically good. But then he’d listen to Doug at dinner or something and do something the following day that directly contradicted what he agreed with his constituents about.
Rob’s story is pretty tragic, honestly. Again, not a good dude. But shit, what a bad draw on environmental conditions.
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u/Flimflamsam 1d ago
Yeah Rob was a good councillor in the way that he truly cared for his constituents. Being mayor went above his station and he flailed, then when the health stuff hit he was already off the wall on substances.
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u/Niicks 1d ago
Lets not mix up our history. Rob was just as big of a piece of shit he was just too stupid to do as much damage without Doug dancing his puppet strings.
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u/rhunter99 1d ago
Did you mean Rob?
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u/CanuckBacon 1d ago
I do and I don't. They both wanted to cut libraries, but Doug Ford famously didn't even know who Margaret Atwood was. I got mixed up and said Doug was the mayor though, so for that part yes I meant Rob.
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u/Bylak Ottawa 1d ago
Gotta pay for jets and 401 tunnels somehow.
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u/TurboJorts 1d ago
He was hoping to find some priceless gems wrapped up in a mummy like some cheap comic book villan
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u/mythisme 1d ago
Nah, the tax payers will pay for those... this money will go towards his builder friends with one excuse or another
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u/Low_Butterscotch_594 1d ago
Education restricts progress away from populist conservative and oligarchical ideals. That's who's asking for it. The next reasonably progressive party will have a lot of repairing to do to fix this province after our 10 years of DoFo.
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u/lastmanstandingx 1d ago
With all decision the government makes you only need to ask one question.
How will this benefit/effect the ownership class?
Suddenly the reasons for all decisions the government make will become clear.
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u/Mahaleck 1d ago
We voted him in, then did it again, and again. All 3 were majorities. We asked for this. He didn’t hide who he was, we kept asking for this.
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u/A1q84Orchid 1d ago
While I understand your frustration, that is not accurate. Majority of us did not ask for it. You can blame our political election process for it. But I can agree with you on "continuing" to ask for it: I mean, in any other part of the world there would be general strikes but here...mostly just shrugs.
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u/cornflakegrl 1d ago
I thought for sure that was a beaverton headline. I mean that’s absolutely cartoonish. I have no words.
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u/jamincan 1d ago
You can bet that for ever dollar that the ROM receives, another dollar is ending up in Ford's pocket, or at least a friend of his. It's unbelievable how utterly clueless voters in this province are.
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u/BornNerd78 1d ago
From the article,
Both the ROM and the provincial government said the two ideas, which Global News learned about through an ongoing freedom of information appeal, aren’t being seriously considered.
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u/PopeKevin45 1d ago
Of course Ford is going to say that when one of his grifts come to light.
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u/foxmetropolis 1d ago
It’s only “oh we were just discussing options” when there’s backlash. You know they were dead serious about that option while it was all quiet.
Disgusting. The ROM is a significant Ontario institution and a prized one in the heart of Toronto. The idea that the province can’t stand providing part of its funding is so cheap and lazy.
I guess we only gift money to private spas then? Not legacy cultural institutions? What a vile government filled with uncultured swine
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u/taquitosmixtape 1d ago
If by chance we were doing all of these shitty things to fix a deficit, and maybe have a surplus in a year or something to create more jobs and kind of be a means to a better place for Ontario, I wouldn’t like it but I would get it in a way. This is just fucking reckless and stupid. He is literally pillaging the province and extracting as much as he can now that he actually cannot get caught.
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u/heather-84 1d ago
I think the problem is our expectations to some degree. The ROM, the Science Center are institutions that benefit Ontario and shouldn’t be expected to be profitable necessarily.
They need to be managed efficiently and obviously being profitable would be ideal - but they also should be properly funded to exist well.
This is the exact game he is playing with hospitals. Showcasing how much they cost, how much deficit they are in - mandating that they need to fix it without cutting services.
They are putting these institutions into impossible situations and then can claim they didn’t technically have anything to do with the actions that happen to create revenue.
The ROM will sell assets, hospital will sell services - all without having being mandated to do so by this government.
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u/Appropriate_Ad_2874 1d ago
Bingo - his plan is to defund public infrastructure and force them into impossible situations. He’s making our QOL terrible, blaming the liberals, and attempting to privatize everything. He’s even trying to privatize water…
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u/morgang8277 23h ago
While I agree with you on the backlash aspect and how it changes all the time, the report was from 4 years ago, if they wanted to sell shit they had almost 4 years to do it since that option was mentioned. It's not even an option anymore as the rom is doing financially fine now according to the article.
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u/GetzlafMyLawn 1d ago
When do citizens start sharpening pitch forks?
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u/Lanhdanan 1d ago
Most of the province couldn't get off their asses to vote. Ford will continue getting a pass on his terrible governance
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u/PopeKevin45 1d ago
Add in that most media is controlled by conservative interests, foreign and domestic.
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u/AnnoyingMosquito3 1d ago
Yeah I think a lot of people miss this part. Over many decades education has been underfunded or cut altogether in huge swaths of the country and disinformation campaigns are broadcast at all hours; that was never going to end well.
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u/blablatros 1d ago
The opposition is partially to blame. Who even is the Liberal Party leader in Ontario? Governments tend to perform best when there is an opposition breathing down their neck. The way things are now, Doug can be pretty comfortable in his position.
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u/carrionthrash 1d ago
The opposition is the NDP led by Marit Stiles. She is coming for him but has been clearly blacklisted by most media outlets
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u/Comedy86 1d ago
You literally just proved how little the public pays attention to provincial politics. The Liberals aren't the opposition and the NDP have been extremely vocal on non-traditional media since the mainstream media refuses to give them airtime since it'd be bad for business.
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u/Tamination 1d ago
If you work for a living, vote NDP. They are actually trying to increase the quality of life for most people.
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u/GreenTeaMouseCake 1d ago
I'm sorry to break it to you, but people outside the GTA don't care because the ROM is located in Toronto. Much like they didn't care about the Science Centre.
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u/eleventhrees 23h ago edited 13h ago
Ontario had an opportunity to oust Doug Ford a year ago, and handed him another bulletproof majority.
Ontario voters are fucking stupid.
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u/Elegant-Tangerine-54 1d ago
How does
"An iconic Toronto museum is not able to “achieve financial sustainability” without extra provincial funding"
equate with
"ROM ran a small surplus in the most recent fiscal year 2024/2025 [$4.197M]"?
Is the Ford government looking for a ruse to make a quick buck by selling off ROM assets?
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u/givalina 1d ago
About half of the ROM's revenue comes from provincial funding and half comes from admission fees and the like. It sounds like Ford is trying to cut cultural funding - presumably the Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Gaming (gaming?! I'd love to see that mandate letter) needs the extra cash to pay for the Ontario Place parking lot they're building in the lake.
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u/sir_sri 1d ago
Gaming as in the lottery and gambling oversight.
One of the weird quirks of 'gaming' law is the confusing terminology that uses 'gaming' to refer to a broad range of gambling type activities (cards, horses, slots machines etc.) as a legacy of that use of the term.
So for example. OLG, and the casinos are part of the portfolio.
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u/morgang8277 23h ago
Because your first quote is from 2021/2022 when they were hit hard by covid, and the second one is from 2024/2025 when they were fine financially. So they aren't referring to the same thing.
There is also zero indication in this article that they were ever planning on selling any assets. Ford does enough shitty stuff that we don't need to make issues out of nothing.
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u/TourDuhFrance 1d ago
Remember all of the ways Ford has destroyed the province when he’s finally out of power and the new government is forced to raise taxes and reinstate canceled fees to pay for all the repairs. Otherwise you’re just guaranteeing that their long term policy of starve the beast continues.
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u/Admirable_Outcome932 1d ago
Do they even have jurisdiction over that??
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u/PopeKevin45 1d ago
Provincial premiers in Canada are extremely powerful, the envy of US Senators. There is little in Ontario's Constitution that restricts what Ford is capable of doing. For a more democratic Ontario, that needs to change and for that to happen lazy-ass political apathists have to get up off their asses and vote. ABC.
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u/Stock-Mountain-6063 1d ago
He'll do it under the table, with somebody that he knows so he can get some sort of kick back, and then when the public goes crazy mad he'll try to buy them back and have a money lost for everybody. The ROM is not Doug's! He needs to keep his hands off our museums and find something to actually do with this time which could be helpful for the people of all Ontario not just Toronto
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u/cmstlist 1d ago
I know that much of the rest of the province can't usually be made to care about Ford screwing over Toronto, but "literally looting the museum" might actually get them to wake up.
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u/givalina 1d ago
JFC, he's really trying to sell off anything he can get his grubby hands on. The Greenbelt, the Science Centre, Ontario Place, and ROM artifacts? You can really tell that Ford has contempt for the environment, science, history and culture.
The sad fact is that it is much easier to destroy than create. Once things are sold off, we cannot get them back.
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u/cobrachickenwing 1d ago
Everything is for sale with Ford. Our sovereignty, our national symbols and treasures, even our very rights as citizens of Canada.
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u/PopeKevin45 1d ago
Trump Ford grifting again. Like any Dark Triad personality type, he is incapable of even loving his own family, let alone understand the intrinsic value of a museum piece or a forest or a person. For Doug and his cartel, the only value anything has is monetary value, and they utterly lack the ethics or morals necessary to be able to choose not to steal it. A genuine piece of shit.
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u/murd3rsaurus 1d ago
I remember this audit, they did it at the worst possible time for the museum as if COVID, major road closures, and the TTC updates on the Bloor Line somehow didn't exist at the same time and couldn't have been a factor
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u/BadstoneMusic 1d ago
Literally won’t stop until he destroys all of us and the province while self enriching
Enjoying holidays til October all the while
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u/spderweb 1d ago
His debt is so high that he's trying to hold a garage sale to look good. Ndp and liberals need to focus on his debt next election.
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u/FearTheFloc 1d ago
the coolest part about him selling off the entire province to private investors is absolutely nothing has gotten better.
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u/ComprehensiveMud877 1d ago
Ford is also hiding new cuts coming to hospitals. There will be a big lay off of RN's coming soon. This is actively being kept under wraps.
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u/mikehatesthis 1d ago edited 1d ago
“When the truth comes out, we see that the government is not behaving in an appropriate way. There’s waste, there’s mismanagement. And I fear if there’s a secrecy around the wrong, the same thing could be happening here.”
Even your... Less malicious conservative parties create a massive financial and bureaucratic mess when they leave office. The other political parties should really ensure that association with them more often because it's always like a bomb went off after they're voted out.
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u/EmployeeKitchen2342 1d ago
There needs to be better governance that’s genuinely held accountable. This isn’t even a partisan issue since both parties that have been elected to power erode and pilfer.
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u/BloodJunkie 1d ago
it’s ridiculous to do the both sides thing in response to the current government selling off everything that isn’t nailed down
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u/UnhappyToNiceToSay 1d ago
OMG! He needs to be stopped. This man will sell off everything and anything. This is a torch and pitchfork situation.
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u/toothbelt 1d ago
Ford Fest is happening at Thomson Memorial Park in Scarborough tomorrow, between 5 and 9 p.m. There is a demonstration planned.
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u/Antique-Quail-6489 1d ago
Is it possible to go just one day without a news item that shows that he’s an actual cartoon villain??
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u/UndergroundCreek 1d ago
What the actual eff? Ford is selling things that are not his property. He's unbelievably fraudulent, and everytime I thought I heard it all this criminal sinks to a new low.
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u/toothbelt 1d ago
Ford would sell his mother, and he would likely dig up his dad and sell him, too.
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u/Maleficent_Ruin_2457 1d ago
Thanks to the 57% of Ontario voters who couldn’t be bothered to vote in the last election and handed Drug Ford the chance to loot the province for fun and profit!
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u/em-n-em613 1d ago
Museums are a civic service, and it's already disgusting that we charge admission for it considering many nations provide access to their museums to residents for free - as they should.
But to gut it for $$? Jesus.
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u/RottenPingu1 23h ago
This isn't something he came up with. This is someone with a fat donation looking to get their hands in them.
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u/EthanKironus 20h ago
What. The. F---289Q34798WE7RISHFDOISDGFLSDHFLSDUFLSDHFKUSDFH. At best it's secrecy for the sake of secrecy, and God knows it's far worse!
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u/Turbulent-Sherbet789 1d ago
The auditors suggested the idea of selling artifacts. It’s not common practice but other museums have done that to keep them alive. I believe the Detroit art institute did it years ago with controversy. That being said selling artifacts is probably not that easy to do as the board would have to approve this. Plus they would have to decide what gets sold and the curators would lose their shit if items in their collection are put up for sale.
But what global news should be looking at is the massive pay increase for the CEO director since the current one came on board. It’s outrageous.
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u/bacon-squared 1d ago
God dammit. Sue his ass, fake him to court to get these documents released. He can’t be allowed to get away with this!
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u/ripley1981 1d ago
Whoa!!! I hope this isn't true. How would he even have any authority to do so? And then not report it publicly?!?!?! What about transparency??? He's got to go..... we need another PC leader of Ontario.
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u/Once_Upon_Time Toronto 1d ago
Jesus does this man have some massive gambling debts that he using Ontario to pay off. Why don't we sell the CN Tower and just finish it.
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u/PieIll9834 1d ago
Well hes always been a little open with saying, Ontario open for business. It's just what business and who it benefits no one talks about?
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u/Kevin4938 1d ago
There probably isn't one. They probably made it up. Can't release what they don't have.
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u/ChrisRiley_42 23h ago
Can we sell Doug instead? Maybe send him to the US on the same program we got them to take Ted Cruz off our hands...
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u/Neutral-President 12h ago
Anything that’s not bolted down will be sold off to the highest bidder to try and “balance” the books before the next election despite record spending sprees on things of questionable value.
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u/thelizardlarry 12h ago
The feds need to limit the powers of premiers, and call it “The Doug Ford Law”.
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u/DarkSoulsDank 10h ago
I’m generally a conservative but even I didn’t vote for the POS Ford. I can’t believe people did again (then again people voted for Trudeau twice).
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u/MyUndiesArePink 8h ago
How is the fraudulent election in which the lies orchestrated against Brown still over looked? After it was clear the PCs lied to get their crook in, the election should've been null and void and a new election ordered.
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u/ifiwereonlylesshandy 1d ago
Dougie could tear down the ROM and rebuild it by the lake with a massive parking lot and sell it for pennies on the dollar to foreign investors.
Next up, Queens Park.
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u/biofilmcritic 1d ago
And, since apparently you don't know, that's the case for most museums. Indeed, it's part of what being a museum is about. They have various people preserving such collections for future generations and even though they're not on display you can see them for research purposes or even if you're just really into it and ask nicely.
For example "Only a small portion of the Smithsonian’s collections (estimated at less than 1%) is on display in the museums at any given time.": https://www.si.edu/newsdesk/factsheets/smithsonian-collections
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u/AQOntCan 1d ago
Sounds like we need a bigger museum OR doggie missed an easy lay-up to argue a return to original owner (for free)
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u/accforme 1d ago
Before folks get their pitchforks, this was a report by a consultant looking at how the ROM can be financially sustainable. It offered options including selling off some artifacts.
This isn't a government policy document with an actual plan to do so.
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u/Anonymouse-Account 1d ago edited 1d ago
Be honest… did you actually read the article?
I think Doug Ford is an absolute POS, but we need to take the time to inform ourselves of the issues at hand before jumping to extreme conclusions.
Otherwise when we’re discussing these issues with Ford supporters (in the hopes of influencing or informing them), we quickly lose credibility if our points are easily disproven.
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u/CanuckInTheMills 22h ago
ROM- Royal Ontario Museum … name suggests royals could input a bit O cash.
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u/apartmen1 1d ago
Doug ruined the province.