Oakwood (provincial electoral district)

Oakwood was a provincial electoral district in Ontario, Canada. It was created for the 1975 provincial election, and was retained until redistribution in 1999. It was abolished into Davenport, Eglinton—Lawrence, York South—Weston and St. Paul's. Oakwood was located in York, which was previously part of Metropolitan Toronto and is now part of the City of Toronto.

Oakwood

Ontario electoral district
Defunct provincial electoral district
Legislature	Legislative Assembly of Ontario
District created	1975
District abolished	1997
First contested	1975
Last contested	1999
Demographics
Census division(s)	Toronto
Census subdivision(s)	Toronto

Oakwood was a fairly safe seat for the New Democratic Party for most of its existence, although the Liberals won in 1987 and 1995. Both Liberal MPPs, Chaviva Hošek and Mike Colle, served in the Ontario cabinet at one time or another.

The longest-serving member for Oakwood was Tony Grande, who held the seat from 1975 to 1987. Tony Rizzo, elected in 1990, was forced to sit as an Independent MP for twenty months after it was disclosed that his construction firm had been charged with violating Ontario's labour code in 1989. He returned to caucus in 1992.^[1]

The riding had large Italian and Portuguese communities, and there was a significant increase in Caribbean immigrants during the 1980s.^[2]

Members of Provincial Parliament

Oakwood
Assembly	Years	Member		Party
Created from parts of York South and York-Forest Hill ridings in 1975
30th	1975–1977		Tony Grande	New Democratic
31st	1977–1981
32nd	1981–1985
33rd	1985–1987
34th	1987–1990		Chaviva Hosek	Liberal
35th	1990–1995		Tony Rizzo[nb 1]	New Democratic
36th	1995–1999		Michael Colle	Liberal
Sourced from the Ontario Legislative Assembly[3]
Merged into Davenport, Eglinton—Lawrence, York South—Weston and St. Paul's (1999)

Electoral results

1975 boundaries

1975 Ontario general election

	Party	Candidate	Votes[4][nb 2]	Vote %
	New Democrat	Tony Grande	7,302	40.3
	Liberal	Richard Meagher	5,939	32.8
	Conservative	J.A. Marrese	4,619	25.5
	Communist	Val Bjarnason	267	1.5
		Total	18,127

1977 Ontario general election

	Party	Candidate	Votes[5][nb 3]	Vote %
	New Democrat	Tony Grande	9,390	43.3
	Conservative	Fergy Brown	6,550	30.2
	Liberal	Richard Meagher	5,128	23.6
	Independent	Willis Cummins	238	1.7
	Communist	Val Bjarnason	232	1.7
	Libertarian	Alex Eaglesham	153	0.7
		Total	21,691

1981 Ontario general election

	Party	Candidate	Votes[6]	Vote %
	New Democrat	Tony Grande	9,235	45.0
	Conservative	Harriet Wolman	6,241	30.4
	Liberal	Jean Gammage	4,401	21.4
	Communist	Nan McDonald	654	3.2
		Total	20,531

1985 Ontario general election

	Party	Candidate	Votes[7]	Vote %
	New Democrat	Tony Grande	11,076	42.3
	Liberal	Joe Ricciuti	10,093	38.5
	Conservative	Harriet Wolman	4,663	17.8
	Communist	Mike Sterling	366	1.4
		Total	26,198

1987 boundaries

1987 Ontario general election

	Party	Candidate	Votes[8][nb 4]	Vote %
	Liberal	Chaviva Hošek	12,586	48.5
	New Democrat	Tony Grande	10,938	42.1
	Conservative	Irene Paparo-Stein	1,741	6.7
	Communist	Geoff da Silva	689	2.7
		Total	25,954

v t e 1990 Ontario general election
Party	Candidate	Votes	%
	New Democratic	Tony Rizzo	10,572	48.9
	Liberal	Chaviva Hošek	8,196	37.9
	Conservative	Claudio Lewis	1,712	7.9
	Green	Steven Peck	589	2.7
	Libertarian	John Primerano	359	1.7
	Communist	Elizabeth Rowley	206	1.0
Total			21,634
123 out of 134 polls reporting.
"How Metro-Area Voted". The Toronto Daily Star. Toronto. 1990-09-07. p. A10.

v t e 1995 Ontario general election
Party	Candidate	Votes	%
	Liberal	Mike Colle	8,599	42.3
	New Democratic	Tony Rizzo	7,624	37.5
	Conservative	Courtney Doldron	3,298	16.2
	Independent	Joseph Flexer	301	1.7
	Green	Constantine Kritsonis	269	1.3
	Natural Law	Doug Storey	136	0.7
	Libertarian	Nunzio Venuto	100	0.5
Total			20,327
"Summary of Valid Ballots by Candidate". Elections Ontario. 1995-06-08. Retrieved 2012-09-04.