Scott Radley: Hamilton councillors on Zoom: What is that in the background?
Look past Coun. Sam Merulla to the walls behind him during online council meetings, and you can see paintings of two of his beloved dogs that passed away recently. Or a Spectator photo taken the night he won the 2006 election. Or even a shot of his parents that was taken in the '50s as they were walking along King Street.
Seems there was a photographer who'd hang out downtown and charge 10 cents to snap a shot. You'd give him your dime and your address and a print would show up a couple weeks later.
That picture is one of those thousands if not tens of thousands that photographer took," he says.
Video cameras during remote meetings have given a glimpse into councillors' homes and personalities like never before - often with intriguing background stories.
Take Ward 2 Coun. Jason Farr. Over his right shoulder when he appears on camera from his city hall office is a black-and-white portrait of Frank Sinatra. Turns out, he's been a huge fan of Old Blue Eyes ever since his first broadcast job at a big band radio station in Fort Erie (a station that eventually lost its licence because its signal was interfering with Buffalo Airport radio traffic).
He was 18 or 19 and attending Niagara College. Most of the music drove him nuts but he loved Sinatra, to the point he'd go all Chairman Of The Board for the military veterans in the crowd at karaoke every Thursday night while gathering courage on 80-cent half pints.
I was called Vegas Jay at the Driftwood Tavern," he says.
Betcha didn't know that.
Maria Pearson's walls are also covered with black-and-white photos. There's one of her husband in front of his '53 GMC. There's one of Stoney Creek council. There's a picture of her husband's mother and her siblings - his aunt and uncle - standing behind what was apparently the biggest sturgeon ever pulled out of the Bay of Quinte.
And there's a cherished shot of her late father looking handsome in his Italian army uniform in Naples just as he was preparing to be deployed for battle.
The war ended just as he was supposed to go fight," she says. Thankfully."
Esther Pauls is known to be a woman of faith and the signs in her house reflect that. In her kitchen, one says Serve the Lord." In another room is the verse, Those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength, they will soar on wings like eagles, they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint." That one was given to the family by a friend when Pauls' husband, Gord, was about to run three Iron Man triathlons in three days to raise money for Haiti. A total of $258,000 as it turns out.
In 2020," Pauls says, that is an inspiration."
Faith is also part of Judi Partridge's office decor. Literally. A carved sign that says Faith sits below one that says Passion. She and her father - who passed away last year at 98 - were shopping at The Emporium in Dundas some time ago and saw them.
He said, Those two words really describe you,'" she says. And he bought them for me."
They frame a Tom Thompson print of a trail through the woods that she loves. And her fake fireplace.
Yeah, what's the deal with the fake fireplace?
Partridge says her office at city hall is so cold all the time - 12 to 15 degrees one year - she brought it in just to stay thawed out during the winter.
When Ward 11's Brenda Johnson finds herself on camera, it's impossible not to notice the gigantic gaming chair that's surely leading to pangs of envy from every Fortnite player out there. Truth is, early on in the working-from-home months she was sitting on a lawn chair with four pillows and it was killing her so she eventually splurged and bought something that saves her back and butt.
The rest of the room, though, isn't exactly lavish. With a small house and a retired husband at home, she says there aren't a lot of options for work space. So if you look closely you'll notice her office is set up in the laundry room.
If you hear the bell ring, it means my sheets are done," she quips.
Has that happened? No, she insists. But during one online meeting her dryer started rattling and shaking. The hazards of her situation.
Behind Terry Whitehead each time he connects to online meetings is a print of a Shirley Deaville painting called Early Riser which shows a boy asleep in his bed, puppy at his feet, with his hockey helmet on the pillow beside him on one side and his skates hanging from a chair on the other. His blinds are pulled open and you can see snow falling outside.
It reminds me of the north," says Whitehead, who grew up in Elliot Lake and learned to play hockey on an outdoor rink in a park across the street from his house.
Had the prime minister not been coming to Hamilton a few years ago, the mayor's background would've likely been a simple painting. But when he learned Justin Trudeau would be visiting the city and sitting across the desk from him for a bit, he figured something else was needed.
I asked our graphics department to put something together," Fred Eisenberger says.
They created a montage of the city with Dundurn Castle, Lister Block, Webster's Falls, city hall, the bay, the marina and the art gallery.
With some tulips out front which kind of warms my Dutch heart," he says.
Don't be distracted by the neon blue lights shining from behind the large photo on John-Paul Danko's wall, it's the subject that matters to him. It's a shot of a woman in a flowing white skirt walking in the desert. Who happens to be his wife, Hamilton Wentworth District School Board chair Dawn Danko.
He snapped it when they were in New Mexico a few years back. She'd gone for a conference and he made a 3,000-mile road trip to join her.
Behind Nrinder Nann appear to be framed degrees and diplomas. She couldn't be reached for this piece. Over Tom Jackson's left shoulder is a painting of downtown Hamilton by local artist Katherine Smith and to his right is a collage of Renoirs. Both his wife's touch as he jokes he doesn't have a single artistic gene in his body.
Maureen Wilson's wall is decorated with a sword presented by former police chief Ken Robertson to her husband - former regional chair Terry Cooke - to honour his years of public service. And a large photograph of Hamilton's steel mills at night by local artist Mike Kukucska.
It just shows that raw beauty of industry," she says.
That said, not all councillors have something so personal in view.
Where Lloyd Ferguson lives in rural Ancaster, there isn't fast-enough internet service to hook into meetings so he does most of his work from his office above the public library. He's blasted by a fluorescent light so bright that Farr's mother has apparently asked if something could be done about it. Chad Collins has a 1960s landscape painting in his basement behind him. No deep meaning, just one he really likes. And Brad Clark's dining room walls are plain white. As in, nothing.
That's on purpose," the Ward 9 councillor says.
If the background is cluttered, people will pay attention to that rather than your words, he says. So he actually took down a painting to leave a blank slate.
I just make sure my background is as boring as possible," he says.
Then there's Arlene VanderBeek. Appropriately, the Ward 13 councillor has her camera set up in her home office where the most prominent feature is a jammed bookshelf. And the most visible book? A guide on how to use Excel 97.
Um, please tell us that's not what she's still operating.
No," she laughs. I promise, I'm not."
As for Merulla, the touching photos of his parents and dogs are beautiful but it was something else the cameras caught that certainly earned him the Zoom moment of the year.
As the Ward 4 councillor was making an earnest point to the rest of council some time back, Angel the Rottweiler - who'd just been fed some steak and apparently gulped it a little too quickly - began walking slowly up the steps behind him. Getting herself perfectly in frame. Then stopping. And heaving.
Puking," Merulla laughs. Right while I'm speaking."
Scott Radley is a Hamilton-based columnist at The Spectator. Reach him via email: sradley@thespec.com