Homeless former MPP moving from shelter with help of friends and former adversaries

Article content

If the support network of political allies and even former adversaries formed to assist a homeless former Ontario MPP succeeds in its drive to help, he will be out of an Ajax, Ont., shelter within a week.

Lorenzo Berardinetti, a former municipal councillor and four-time Liberal MPP, lost his Scarborough-Southwest seat in the 2018 election. In 2022, his attempted return to municipal politics in Scarborough failed. Then, his health did too. He suffered a seizure and was in a coma for a month. His marriage had already broken down in 2021. An attempt to live with his brother didn’t work out, leaving him with living in a shelter as his only option.

But that’s about to change.

This past week, former Liberal deputy premier George Smitherman went out apartment hunting with Berardinetti. They looked at four prospects. Two were good, and one became a favourite.

Smitherman says the aim is to have Berardinetti “well-housed seven nights from now,” he said Friday. “Next is the furniture, pots and pans.” The support network has had multiple offers to stock the apartment, Smitherman’s among them.

The funding to make this happen is coming from a GoFundMe page that went live on Dec. 30, 2024, with the aim of assisting Berardinetti in getting out from under his financial and personal troubles.

The initial goal for the GoFundMe page was $25K but when that was surpassed in two days, it was raised to $35K, then to $45K. That latest goal is close at hand. As of late Friday, $44,451 was raised. Donations have range from $5 to a $1K. Since 307 donations have been made so far, that is an average of $150, a respectable sum given that this is not an official charity and there will be no tax receipts.

At least some of the donors probably “couldn’t afford” much, says page organizer, Justin Van Dette. The motivation seems simply to be helping a good man down on his luck. A former Tory staffer at Queen’s Park, then a staffer in the offices of Toronto city councillors Case Ootes and Brad Duguid, Van Dette has history with Berardenetti in both forums. Having been on opposite sides of the political aisle is irrelevant.

Van Dette’s respect for Berardinetti has never waned since those days. So, when he saw Berardinetti’s story initially reported in a local newspaper, he felt compelled to act, put his experience in community fundraising into action, built the GoFundMe page, then reached out to people who are present and former provincial and municipal politicians and staffers.

He rallied the troops, who have come together in a series of phone calls, strategizing how to get Berardinetti out of the Ajax shelter where he has lived for more than a year, and back on his feet. The people who have come together include former Tory MPP Peter Sherman and present Tory MPP Lisa McLeod, former federal Tory MP John Baird, as well as former Liberal premiers Dalton McGuinty and Kathleen Wynne.

“We’re all a big political family,” says Van Dette. At a time when politics doesn’t seem to have much good news to offer and harsh clashes seem to be the order of the day, he says Dalton McGuinty told him the developing success of the cross-political-lines effort to help Berardinetti has been a good news story to start 2025.

First law school, then public service

When Berardinetti entered the University of Toronto law school in the mid-1980s, he did not share the goal common to many law students: making it to Bay Street and a highly-paid living. From the beginning, he aimed toward public service.

When he announced his intention, he was chided by a classmate, who was also a reporter with the Globe and Mail. He would be taking a pay cut, that person said to him. This wasn’t news to Berardinetti. Nor did it have an impact on his intended direction.

So, after first-year basics such as contract, criminal, legal research and Canadian constitutional law, he focused on courses connected to government: civil rights and municipal law.

The latter came in handy shortly after he was both called to the bar and first elected as a city councillor in 1988. An older councillor tried to embarrass him during a meeting: “Do you know what a zoning by-law is?” the elder man asked. Berardinetti quoted chapter and verse from his studies. “He quietly sat down,” Berardinetti says.

He found his political bearings as a Liberal. He felt that being driven by ideology one way or the other got in the way. He described his fellow Liberals as “pragmatic, focused on solving problems.”

He cites a small example from his time representing a Scarborough ward, when he pushed for large planter boxes along a main drag known locally as “furniture alley.” The idea was to beautify a bleak urban stretch. Some local businesses kicked up a fuss, he said, but years later the mature trees in those boxes are a welcome addition. “I liked working with businesses.”

Getting out of the shelter

The informal coalition of political people that has formed a supportive network around Berardinetti has been tightly focused on the main problem facing him: getting out of the shelter.

His time there has involved a curfew, being subjected to a nightly search as he enters (against weapons), and bunking down on a cot in a communal room. He’s just looking forward to having his own bedroom again, his own fridge, a microwave.

He notes that integral to a move from the shelter is a federal-provincial housing program called the Canada-Ontario Housing Benefit. Administered by the Ontario government, it provides households with a portable housing benefit to assist with rental costs in the private housing market. The benefit can be used to help pay rent anywhere in Ontario.

But there’s a trade-off. Getting the benefit is linked to removing oneself off any list for public housing. This is a risk that Berardinetti has been willing to take, especially given the support he has been receiving.

“I’m grateful for the help,” he says, repeatedly.

There has been some talk about a formal trusteeship to handle the GoFundMe proceeds. Berardinetti is clear that he doesn’t want to handle the funds. However, it looks like Smitherman and Van Dette may take on that task more informally.

One of the options for the funds raised in excess of the original goal is to donate them to the Ontario Association of Former Parliamentarians, with the intention to build up a cache to help future former political people who find themselves struggling. In the meantime, Smitherman says, it’s necessary to ensure there are sufficient funds to get Berardinetti up and running.

After 13 months in a shelter, there is bound to be an adjustment period as he transitions back into average everyday life, notes Smitherman. He is advising Berardinetti that a dreamed-of move to set up a full-time law practice in Ajax, with all the responsibilities that would entails, should be taken up slowly.

Lessons from ‘Lorenzo’s predicament’

Meanwhile, “Lorenzo’s predicament” has brought the issue of politicians struggling to return to private life after an election loss into the fore, say Smitherman. Other stories are coming up, he says, though he isn’t naming names at this point. There is one particular case he is investigating.

Smitherman says with a touch of humour that he recognizes “politicians aren’t the most sympathetic lot.”

However, he adds it’s a distinct mistake for Ontarians to equate their MPPs with federal MPs, who are entitled to a significant pension after six years. He also notes that Ontario MPPs haven’t had a raise since 2008.

He speaks seriously of the mental health impact of “the change of status” after an election loss. Berardinetti was hit with a multitude of setbacks, he notes, including election loss, divorce and a seizure that led to lengthy hospital time in a coma.

However, he has been “really struck by how 13 months in the shelter hasn’t lessened Lorenzo’s compassion for other people. It’s highly animated. He has a sense of calm I didn’t expect.”

Still, he says, Lorenzo’s story has shown how ex-politicians share the same fragility experienced by others. That means the support network is determined to stick by him, rather than hand over funds and cut Berardinetti loose to fend for himself.

“We’re going to be there to support Lorenzo in the long term.”

Our website is the place for the latest breaking news, exclusive scoops, longreads and provocative commentary. Please bookmark nationalpost.com and sign up for our daily newsletter, Posted, here.