Michelle Holland (born 1973) is a Canadian politician. She was elected to Toronto City Council in the 2010 city council election, defeating Adrian Heaps in Ward 35."Changed council faces new mayor". Toronto Star, October 25, 2010.
Background Holland was born and raised in Chatham, Ontario. She started working as a student in the offices of Deputy Prime Minister Herb Gray in Windsor during her undergraduate degree in 1995. She also worked for MPPs Sandra Pupatello and Dave Levac. She spent some time working as a consultant before entering politics herself.Marianne Takacs. Passions for public transit and the arts; Longtime Liberal elected to Ward 35 wants to bring collegiality, not partisanship, to the new city council. Toronto Star. November 27, 2010. pg. GT2. She then moved to Toronto to pursue her studies in International Relations at the University of Toronto.
She married Lorenzo Berardinetti on October 7, 2004. He served as Liberal Member of Provincial Parliament for Scarborough Southwest from 2003 to 2018 and had previously been a city councillor (Ward 37)."‘Liberal gladiators’ help Berardinetti to re-election". Toronto Observer, October 7, 2011. Known by the surname Berardinetti for a brief period of her political career, she reverted to using her maiden surname in 2014 after their legal separation."Scarborough Southwest Councillor now to be known as Michelle Holland for city business". Scarborough Mirror, February 23, 2016. They finalized their divorce in 2018.
Politics In 2006, she ran for city councillor in the riding of Scarborough Southwest. She ran on a campaign of making sure that Scarborough got its "fair share" of tax dollars. She said, "A lot of our property tax dollars are being spent downtown and not here." She declared, "a road downtown will get paved two or three times before one is paved out here." City officials pointed out that this was not true, that road maintenance was based on need not location. In 2005, Scarborough accounted for 24% of the road repair budget which was commensurate with its population.Jennifer Lewington. Fresh faces abound in wild, wild east: Four wards have no incumbent running. Globe and Mail. November 10, 2006. pg A14. She narrowly lost by 89 votes.
On November 11, 2006, two days before the election The Globe and Mail published an article by columnist John Barber that endorsed Heaps while belittling Holland. Barber characterized her as the "wife of local MPP Lorenzo Berardinetti and so-called 'political adviser' (read: pillow talker). Scarborough deserves better than nepotism."John Barber. Wise Council: In these wards, the choice is clear. The Globe and Mail. November 11, 2006. pp M1, M4. Holland complained to the Ontario Press Council, saying the article made "serious, damaging" statements about her. The press council agreed that the article was unfair.Press Council upholds complaint. The Globe and Mail. March 16, 2007. pg. A11. In December The Globe and Mail published a correction stating that Holland was "unfairly demeaned" and that she in fact had more than 10 years experience working in government.John Barber. A skeptic might ask, How green is their valley?. Globe and Mail. December 6, 2006. pg. A14.
In early 2007, she sued Heaps for defamation. She claimed that he defamed her by reprinting the article claiming that he was the favourite and that Holland was not qualified for the job.Vanessa Lu and Paul Moloney. City pays councillor's legal bill; $60,000 boost will help Adrian Heaps over lawsuit when he was a private citizen running for office. Toronto Star. December 12, 2009. pg GT4. Heaps and Holland eventually settled out of court with Heaps issuing an apology and paying for legal expenses.Councillor refuses legal-fee reimbursement, Globe and Mail, January 26, 2010, pg A11.
In the 2010 election, Holland ran again for the ward against Heaps. One of the major issues was bike lanes in the ward. Holland claimed that unconnected bike lanes on Pharmacy Avenue and Birchmount Road were leading some residents who lived on those streets to move out of the ward. Holland, who described them as "bike lanes to nowhere", said that she would replace them with sharrows.Don Peat, Bike lanes irk councillor, Toronto Sun, November 22, 2010.Kristofer Baker. Ward 35 candidates spar over unconnected bike lanes, The Toronto Observer. September 30, 2010. This time she won the election by 2,203 votes.
Holland lost to fellow incumbent Gary Crawford in Ward 20 during the 2018 Toronto municipal election.
Election results 2018 Toronto election, Ward 20 Scarborough Southwest Candidate Votes Percentage(incumbent)Gary Crawford10,50535.73%(incumbent)Michelle Holland-Berardinetti10,09434.33%Mohsin Bhuiyan2,9109.9%Paulina Corpuz1,8136.17%Suman Roy1,5825.38%Gerard Arbour1,1874.04%Curtis Smith5411.84%Robert McDermott3671.25%Bruce Waters2460.84%John Letonja1600.54%
2014 Toronto election, Ward 35 Candidate Name Number of votes % of votesMichelle Berardinetti 11,91963.25Paul Bocking 2,72214.44Sharif Ahmed 9274.92Christopher Upwood8904.72Shahid Uddin 8314.41Teferi Assefa 4872.58Anwarul Kabir 4032.14Saima Shaikh 3892.06Jason Woychesko 2771.47Total18,845100
2010 Toronto election, Ward 35 Candidate Votes %Michelle Berardinetti 8,293 50.4Adrian Heaps 6,020 36.6 Malik Ahmad 850 5.2 Victoria Doyle 429 2.6 Ed Green 253 1.6 John Lewis 183 1.1 Jay Burnett 173 1.1 Peter Tijiri 90 0.6 John Morawietz 76 0.5 Jason Woychesko 70 0.4 Total 16,437 100%
2006 Toronto election, Ward 35 Candidate Votes %Adrian Heaps 2,949 23.8Michelle Berardinetti 2,860 23.1Dan Harris 1,853 14.9Elizabeth Moyer 1,371 11.1Mike Kilpatrick 1,098 8.9Worrick Russell 786 6.3Sharif Ahmed 669 5.4Norman Lovatsis 436 3.5Jason Carey 113 0.9Armando Calderon 94 0.8Michael Brausewetter 89 0.7Tony Festino 52 0.4Axcel Cocon 30 0.2Total 12,400 100%
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