Toronto Mayor John Tory is correct that there’s no magic solution to reducing violent urban street crime.

But the necessary first step to effectively address growing gang and gun violence in the Greater Toronto Area is for politicians to advocate real solutions, not imaginary ones, such as municipal handgun bans.

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In that sense, a meeting of GTA mayors and regional chairmen hosted by Tory last week was a step in the right direction.

Instead of going on and on about politically correct but ineffective handgun bans, the municipal leaders focused on gun smuggling across the U.S.-Canada border, easy bail for those accused of gun crimes and lax sentences for those convicted of them.

With 80% of illegal handguns in Toronto smuggled in from the U.S., it’s long past time to stop harassing legal gun owners and crack down on illegal smuggling, which will require improved co-operation among the federal, Ontario and municipal governments.

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Our revolving-door justice system is the responsibility of the Ontario and federal governments.

Bail hearings are presided over by justices of the peace, appointed by the province.

The most serious criminal offences are handled by judges, appointed by Ottawa.

It’s all well and good for municipal leaders to call for tougher bail and stiffer sentences for those repeatedly accused, and convicted of gun crimes.

But nothing will change until the provincial and federal governments put a priority on ending revolving door justice when it comes to bail and sentencing.

We don’t need new laws.

The laws we have are more than adequate to impose appropriate bail conditions and sentences on those repeatedly accused and convicted of gun crimes.

But that will only happen if justices of the peace and judges make the protection of society their priority in rendering their decisions.

Mayors and police chiefs have no power to address that.

Only the provincial and federal governments do.

We’re all for requiring people who are out on bail accused of violent urban gun crime to wear ankle monitoring bracelets, as Tory and others advocated.

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But the elephant in the room that Tory and others keep refusing to acknowledge is that shootings in Toronto and the GTA have skyrocketed since the provincial government banned police street checks.

That’s because street checks are a fundamental tool of police intelligence gathering, in order to prevent gun crime before it happens, not just react to it after it happens.

How many more people have to be killed and wounded by gunfire before politicians at all levels of government acknowledge this reality, which they won’t do now because they’re afraid of being accused of racism by people who hate the police no matter what they do?

We agree there are no magical solutions to violent urban gun crime.

But there are real solutions that politicians, at all levels of government, are ignoring.