Alan Slobodsky may have been likened to a jeweller’s cloth for helping to smooth Mel Lastman’s rough edges and easing the transition of an initially clunky megacity into a polished operation.
Slobodsky, who died last month of pancreatic cancer at age 54, was chief of staff to Lastman, Toronto’s first megacity mayor from 1998 to 2003 and served as an aide when Lastman was mayor of the former City of North York.
Lastman, 83, who kept in touch almost daily with his former aide until a few days before Slobodsky’s death, recalled the first time the young man applied for an aide’s job in his office.
“After talking to him for 10 minutes, I hired him. I knew he was the guy,” Lastman told The CJN.
What made him so appealing?
“His attitiude, his smile, his not getting excited about anything I would say or do, and his dealing with people,” Lastman recalled.
Slobodsky’s job as chief of staff when Lastman was Toronto mayor included lobbying members of council. When a councillor would oppose a Lastman idea, Slobodsky “would treat him with respect. He could always go back to that [councillor].”
It was the same with members of the public, who Lastman would refer to Slobodsky. “Not one of them ever called back and said there’s a problem. You could rely on him. If he said he was going to do something, he did it. There isn’t a person who didn’t have a good word to say about him. Not one.”
Trained as an urban planner, Slobodsky quietly built consensus and played key roles in guiding the newly amalgamated city through difficult stages, said former Toronto city councillor Howard Moscoe.
“Alan was a diplomat. He got along with everyone. He was a real mensch,” Moscoe told The CJN. “Mel had some very rough edges and Alan helped smooth away a lot of them. He humanized Mel.”
Slobodsky’s “major role was getting everyone onside,” said Moscoe, who often tangled with Lastman publicly. “Even though Alan was a spokesman for his office, I never felt that he was the enemy. He could always find the compromise. He played a significant role, and people felt they could trust him.”
Slobodsky was born in Toronto in 1961. His father, Cecil, was a well-known kosher butcher, running the Community Kosher shop on Bathurst Street and later working at a Food City outlet in Thornhill. His son Alan graduated from Ryerson University with a degree in urban and regional planning.
Professionally, “he was the rare person who could cross divides, bring opposing forces together, quell anger in others, find consensus, foster collaboration – all while remaining calm, logical and gracious… he was a great listener and unbelievable doer,” Paul Godfrey, Postmedia’s CEO and former municipal politician, eulogized at Slobodsky’s funeral.
“Alan was not a splashy political operative. He was the guy who poured water on a political fire rather than fanning its flames. He always juggled expertly and used common sense – a not-so-common trait in politics… He made people happy by handling difficult matters very well.”
After leaving the mayor’s office, Slobodsky set up a successful practice as a development consultant and lobbyist. Clients included blue-chip companies, but also small ratepayers’ associations, including one opposed to apartment and townhouse units proposed for land around the Jaffari Community Centre mosque in Thornhill Woods.
A low-key man who shunned attention, his involvement in the Jewish community wasn’t widely known.
Every Saturday, he went to the Kensington Place retirement residence on Sheppard Avenue to organize minyans. “He would dress all these elderly people in tallesim and wheel them down the halls,” recalled his wife Rochelle. “He would do a minyan, take them back, get a few more wheelchairs and do it again.”
He also served on the development committee of the Jewish Youth Network, which is planning a campus in Richmond Hill to offer educational and recreational programs for youth.
“He was an amazing adviser, team player, knew how to get things done, great networker and just a real mensch,” JYN executive director Rabbi Shmuli Nachlas told The CJN.
“He helped people but he didn’t advertise it,” said his sister, Raizell Unger. “A quiet person.”
Slobodsky is survived by his wife Rochelle; children Jonathan, Alyssa, and Tara; and siblings Mark, Raizell and Karyn.
