PCs ready to rumble in Don Valley West

[attach]7537[/attach]The Progressive Conservatives are ready to take on Premier Kathleen Wynne in Don Valley West whenever a provincial election is called, says Thomas Blackmore, newly elected president of the Don Valley West Provincial PC Association.

Blackmore, 32, who was named successor to outgoing president Matt Hirashi in a Feb. 20 vote at the association’s general meeting in Leaside, says he expects his immediate focus to be on galvanizing support for candidate David Porter.

“He’s the kind of candidate you’re really pleased to have,” Blackmore said of Porter, an Aurora-based accountant who he said has already begun door-to-door canvassing. “He’s done a lot in his business career and now he’s decided that he’s going to give his time to public service.”

Blackmore refers to himself as “hyper-local.”

He grew up in the Yonge and Lawrence area and co-runs a software development company near Eglinton Avenue East and Redpath Avenue. A grandson of John Black Aird, one-time Liberal Lieutenant Governor of Ontario, he says his conservative leanings are a matter of “personal choice.”

“As a business owner — somebody trying to employ people and grow the economy — the Progressive Conservative platform speaks to me,” Blackmore said.

The new association president could not furnish figures to show “percentage-wise” his party’s chances of ousting Wynne in Don Valley West, but said “it’s not unheard of for a party leader to be bounced from their own riding.”

“It was a conservative riding for a long time, and we think it will be again,” Blackmore said.