Mississauga Mayor Hazel McCallion lashed out in frustration Wednesday over all the attention Rob Ford’s ongoing scandal has generated at the expense of a pressing GTA issue.

“We know more about the Ford family than we do about congestion in the GTA,” McCallion complained to her fellow councillors at a general committee meeting.

McCallion was upset that residents across the GTA weren’t paying attention to Monday’s Metrolinx announcement on its final Big Move funding proposals to the province.

Councillor Nando Iannicca was quick to jump in.

“I know more about Mr. Ford’s birthday and a cake than I do about this.”

They said they were frustrated by the lack of information that got out to the public about the specifics of the proposed tools, including corporate parking levies, a 1 per cent HST increase, higher development fees and a gas tax hike, to pay the $2 billion annual bill for the Big Move.

Mississauga, which wants to build a $1.6 billion LRT under the regional transit strategy, has planned a series of consultations with residents before it will advise the province ahead of its final transit funding decision, expected next year.

“If you’re listening to the media, over there in the big hamlet we have next door to us, something’s going on in the mayor’s office, there’s some video,” Iannicca complained to the Star after the meeting. “How does it impact somebody’s life in Cooksville (an area of Mississauga)? It doesn’t. And the big issue that will impact their lives, the LRT at Highway 5 and 10: ‘Oh, something happened, well, we kind of missed it.’”

Iannicca said he agrees that allegations of Ford smoking crack are extremely newsworthy, but he said it was frustrating Monday when many of his residents in a downtown ward hadn’t heard the Metrolinx news.

McCallion has made the Big Move and her city’s planned LRT, from the lakeshore through downtown and north into Brampton, the number one item on her agenda, in what she has said will be her final term. She’s been preaching its importance in the GTA to Premier Kathleen Wynne ever since Wynne became a front runner for the job.

“Because of what’s happening in Toronto, Metrolinx just didn’t get the coverage,” she said of the Monday event unveiling the recommendations.

She called the Ford scandal “sensationalism.”

“It’s sexy.”

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