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Ms. Stintz has taken heat for that decision, with both the mayor and Councillor Doug Ford lashing out at the move publicly.

On Sunday, Ms. Stintz stressed that TTC staff had originally argued in favour of the sole-sourced lease extension with Gateway, leading the commission to first approve it in October. Upon learning of other interested parties, the transit agency recommended going for public bids, but the commission chose to stick with Gateway at a meeting last month.

The review, conducted by Altus Group and obtained by the National Post, examined the existing agreement and two unsolicited bids later offered by International News and New York News for the newsstand operations. Among its reasons for advising the TTC to seek an RFP, was to “ensure the best offer terms.”

“At the current time, there can be no assurances that the best offer has been tabled by the three bidding parties as the process has not been open and transparent and consistently applied,” the report reads.

The TTC meets on Monday, but Ms. Stintz said it’s too late to add the item to the agenda. So, she will bring forward a motion at next month’s meeting “to stop negotiations with Gateway and prepare an RFP for the operations of the newsstands.”

She said she endorses seeking competitive bids now, but notes that going this route is “going to cost us” because the deal with Gateway included a retroactive increase in rent for part of 2012 and all of 2013. That bump amounted to $2-million that the TTC was counting on in its budget.

She said killing the Gateway deal means the TTC will also lose out on capital improvements that were supposed to spruce up the kiosks in time for the Pan Am Games.

“I think it’s disappointing. Had we dealt with this in October, we could have had a much different outcome but we’re going to move forward,” she said.

National Post