On Mayor John Tory’s first day in office, Premier Kathleen Wynne says work is already underway on making SmartTrack jibe with the province’s regional rail plans.

“We see SmartTrack as very much part of the discussion around regional express rail,” Wynne said Monday at Queen’s Park. “We don’t have the details of exactly how those will mesh at this point, but that’s why it’s important that city officials and Metrolinx officials are already sitting down to work.”

Wynne and Tory, meeting officially for the first time at Queen’s Park, called their hour-long conversation on housing and transit “substantive.”

“Although we didn’t come to any final conclusions or decisions today, we’re very clear that we’re going to have regular meetings,” Wynne told reporters. “One of the things that is very important from my perspective is that John has already shown a real commitment to working with the other levels of government.”

As for whether the province is willing to invest more in Toronto for projects like Tory’s above-ground 22-stop campaign rail promise, Wynne said those conversations can’t be pre-empted.

Though she and Tory won’t agree on every subject, Wynne said, the open line of communication lends itself to getting more done.

Monday’s meeting marks a significant change in the relationship between city hall and the province over the past year, which saw Wynne freezing Rob Ford out since November, when he had been stripped by council of most of his mayoral powers.

“It was no accident that on the first morning of my being in office as mayor of Toronto that I came here to Queen’s Park to meet with the premier,” Tory said. “I said throughout the campaign, and I meant it, that I want to use every single opportunity I have to work in partnership with the other governments in this country.”

Responding to criticism that his appointments to council, released Sunday night, had largely shunned left-leaning councillors, Tory said making “veteran” Councillor Pam McConnell one of four deputies was “sincere” and “very significant.”

Tory said he has asked McConnell to lead the city’s commitment to developing a poverty reduction strategy.

His executive team partly resembles the group assembled by Ford during his term, with new faces from the right and centre. It adds four female councillors to a previously all-male group as well as four councillors representing Scarborough.

“I had to make the choices I had to make and I’m confident this group will do the job that it’s intended to do, but I intend to work with every single member of the city council to try to make a stronger, fairer city,” Tory said.

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