Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Doug Holyday

 This page is an archive of the discussion about the proposed deletion of the article below. This page is no longer live. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page rather than here so that this page is preserved as an historic record. The result of the debate was KEEP. &mdash;Korath (Talk) 16:05, Feb 28, 2005 (UTC)

Doug Holyday
This individual is a city councillor and was once the former mayor of a town called Etobicoke until it was effectively merged into Toronto in the late 1990s. Two questions: Does this establish notability beyond other city councillors, enough so that this individual warrants his own independent article on Wikipedia? And, generally speaking, are Toronto city councillors less or more important than Chicago Aldermen? GRider\talk 20:41, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep, former mayor of a major city and current city councillor. - SimonP 22:31, Feb 18, 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep, he is well-known and significant in Toronto. Etobicoke was city, not a town. Kevintoronto 22:47, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep --Spinboy 23:10, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Delete, just under the bar of notability. Megan1967 23:43, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep, of course. Toronto city councillors are indeed worthy of their own articles. Earl Andrew 23:49, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Regardless of how one views city councillors in general, there are cases where a Toronto city councillor's notability is absolutely beyond question: eg. Olivia Chow, Paula Fletcher, Tom Jakobek, etc. For most city council articles that I've worked on, I've quite emphatically not wikied the names of individual councillors beyond the mayor. But in the case of Toronto, I'm less certain of what would be appropriate; Toronto city council directly serves more people than six of Canada's ten provinces. Regardless, however, Holyday was a mayor before the amalgamation of Metropolitan Toronto; to my mind, that puts him above the bar if we're taking the view that mayors always merit articles. Bearcat 00:17, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Delete. There is no way wikipedia can have articles on every elected official in every town. Does Toronto warrant inclusion that other cities don't, or is just because it's a large city? If so how large does a city have to be? Some mayors are known outside of thier cities (and neighboring areas), and when they are they deserve articles. City councillors almost never are, they do not deserve articles. -R. fiend 00:36, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep. Toronto isn't "every town", it's the largest city in Canada.  Toronto City councillors play a significant role in Canadian politics.  CJCurrie 00:47, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep. City councillors aren't notable in and of themselves, but as the last Mayor of Etobicoke before its very controversial 1998 merger into the Toronto megacity (population before merger about 340,000) he rises above the notability bar. --TenOfAllTrades | Talk 00:55, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep--politicians of large cities are notable. Meelar (talk) 03:23, Feb 19, 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep. I strongly disagree that all local politicians are notable enuf for inclusion in an encyclopedia covering the entire universe for all time. However, this guy's multiple roles seems to justify an article. I guess I'm somewhere between Bearcat and R. fiend and TenOfAllTrades's reasoning. Niteowlneils 14:22, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Concur with Ten. Radiant! 11:06, Feb 21, 2005 (UTC)
 * I would sort of like to get an idea of what people are voting to keep here, and why, especially because the citing of "precedents" is very common, and I see a few brewing now. Is it because he is a councillor for a large city? Because he was the mayor of a small city (do we inlcude mayors of all smallish cities then? Towns? Villages?)? Because the merging of the cities was controversial? OK, but does that make him more notable than the merger? Do we have an article on the merger, as it seems so significant to some? If not, why not? And if so, why isn't he just mentioned there? Right now the article says he's a council and ex-mayor, and it comes up with 3 ways of saying he's a conservative. Can anything else be said about this guy other than how many kids he has and where he grew up? I basically hold the opnion that people are usually notable for doing notable things. Politicians are in a position to do plenty of notable things, but just sitting on a committe or whatever is not in itself notable, at least not on a scale like this. -R. fiend 17:26, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * That is a good idea. Should we make a subpage on the main deletion policy page to discuss this? Otherwise, the same arguments will crop up whenever a similar nomination is made. Radiant! 11:06, Feb 21, 2005 (UTC)
 * Depends how you define "small city". Even as a suburb, Etobicoke was one of the 20 largest cities in Canada. But I do agree that there should be discussion of a clear policy on articles of this type. Bearcat 07:06, 23 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep. Past mayor of a city.  -- James Teterenko (talk) 20:55, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep - David Gerard 23:45, 20 Feb 2005 (UTC)

This page is now preserved as an archive of the debate and, like some other VfD subpages, is no longer 'live'. Subsequent comments on the issue, the deletion, or the decision-making process should be placed on the relevant 'live' pages. Please do not edit this page.