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Tony O'Donohue

From Biocrawler, the free encyclopedia.

Anthony (Tony) O'Donohue is a former municipal politician in Toronto. Born in Ireland where he was educated as a civil engineer, O'Donohue moved to Toronto in the 1950s to pursue his profession.

O'Donohue was first elected to Toronto City Council in the 1969 municipal election as an alderman. Though being an early (if moderate) environmentalist, and despite initially being regarded as a reformer on council, O'Donohue was considered a member of city council's conservative "old guard" for much of his career. He ran for mayor in 1972 losing to David Crombie and again in 1978 losing to John Sewell. His 1978 defeat to the left-wing Sewell was seen as a result of vote splitting among several conservative candidates. O'Donohue and another leader of the "old guard", Art Eggleton agreed that only one of them should run against Sewell for mayor in 1980. They were to poll various key people and possibly conduct a public opinion poll to determine which of them had the better chance of toppling the incumbent Mayor. However, according to O'Donohue's memoirs, Eggleton broke the pact and unilaterally declared himself a mayoralty candidate forcing O'Donohue to stay out of the race in order not to split the vote.

O'Donohue remained a city councillor until the 1990s and, by the end of his tenure, was seen as one of the more conservative members of council advocating such measures as a bylaw banning three or more people from congregating in a public place [1] (http://www.eye.net/eye/issue/issue_02.22.96/NEWS/cit0222b.htm)] more than 1994 municipal election when he was defeated in Ward 3 by 28 year old Mario Silva. The result was very close and subjected to several recounts before the matter was settled.

Tony O'Donohue is a long-time supporter of the Liberal Party of Canada. Ironically, both Eggleton and Silva went on to become Liberal Members of Parliament.

Since leaving politics, O'Donohue has remained business running his own company, Environmental Probe Ltd., which helps developers fulfill the requirements of envorinmental assessments and laws.

A lifelong republican, he entered the news again in 2002 as a result of his legal challenge to the Act of Settlement barring Roman Catholics from the throne. He filed an application to the Ontario Superior Court, O'Donohue v. Her Majesty The Queen, calling on the court to strike down the discriminatory sections of the Act as being in violation of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. His case was dismissed in 2003.

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