A Superior Court judge has tossed the request from a city councillor to appeal the city’s new ward boundaries.

The decision, which came in writing on Tuesday, ends Councillor Justin Di Ciano’s nearly year-long endeavour to overturn a decision of the council he sits on.

The three-page decision came after the one-day hearing at Osgoode Hall concluded on Friday.

A Toronto lawyer representing Di Ciano (Ward 5 Etobicoke Lakeshore) and a local resident, Tony Natale, argued at the divisional court that the Ontario Municipal Board had erred when it affirmed the council’s move to 47 wards from 44.

Council voted in November 2016 to increase the the total number of wards after the 47-ward option was recommended by independent consultants following review that took close to four years.

Di Ciano, another councillor, Giorgio Mammoliti (Ward 7 York West), and several private citizens appealed that decision to the OMB, a provincial tribunal that hears land-use disputes, last year.

In December, the majority of a three-member OMB panel sided with the city, agreeing there were “no clear and compelling reasons to interfere with the decision of council.”

Di Ciano and Natale’s lawyer were seeking the opportunity to appeal the decision in court. An appeal, heard by a panel of judges, can only be heard if there is a question of law.

“In my view, there is no good reason to doubt the correctness of the board’s decision,” Justice Katherine Swinton wrote. “The moving parties have failed to show any arguable legal error by the board.”

Both Di Ciano and Natale say they believe a 25-ward option that follows federal electoral districts achieves voter parity, a concept that every vote should have equal weight.

The city’s case before the OMB outlined how the consultant’s recommendation of a 47-ward option achieved voter parity while ensuring several other important factors for effective representation, set out by a Supreme Court decision, were met. Those factors include keeping communities of interest, such as Regent Park, together. The board agreed the 25-ward option did not achieve better voter parity in 2018.

“The board found that the 47-ward structure achieves the goal of effective representation,” Swinton wrote. “The moving parties are really taking issue with the board’s findings of fact, its preference for certain evidence and its weighing of the various factors that go into a finding with respect to ‘effective representation.’ There is no basis for intervention by the Divisional Court with respect to the board’s decision to approve the by-laws.”

In an email, Di Ciano said “we are extremely disappointed our appeal will not proceed.

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“Adding more politicians to city hall serves no one's interest but the political establishment.”

In court, the city asked for clarity around running this year’s election in a separate application after Di Ciano’s lawyer raised concerns that a bylaw allowing 47 councillors, or one per ward, was never passed by council. The city argues a confirming bylaw was passed. Swinton’s decision on that issue, she wrote, will come at a later date.