ON THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL: Good news for Chow just days before nominations close

If you’ve been mulling the idea of running to become mayor of Toronto, you have until Friday. That’s when nominations will (mercifully) close for the upcoming byelection, which already has a record 74 registered candidates.

Prospective candidates have until 2 p.m. on May 12 to get their paperwork in.

The same deadline holds if you’re thinking of getting out. Candidates have until Friday to officially withdraw their nominations. After that, their names will be on the ballot even if they drop their bid.

One person who likely won’t be dropping out is Olivia Chow. Two new polls released this week suggest Chow has a comfortable lead over her rivals, though many voters remain undecided.

“Right now the trend’s going the wrong direction for everybody else except for her,” Forum Research President Lorne Bozinoff told CP24 when discussing his company’s latest poll. “So she's got a good lead. The two people who are closest to her – Mark Saunders and (Josh) Matlow – they're behind her by 14 per cent (among decided voters). They have half of what she has and that's a lot. That's a lot of ground to make up in a campaign.”

Speaking downtown Monday, Chow vowed that if she becomes mayor, the city will develop and own 25,000 new rent-controlled homes over the next eight years on city-owned lands.

She said that would include at least 7,500 affordable units and at least 2,500 would be rent-geared-to-income.

“Our housing crisis is urgent and we can’t count on private developers alone to offer people an affordable place to live,” Chow said. “We have to take control and use the tools and land we have available to us today to build the affordable and rental homes people need now.”

She said she would generate $404 million over eight years by increasing an existing property tax levy known as the City Building Fund by 0.33 per cent – or roughly $11 per household in Toronto – in order to pay for some of the soft costs. Construction would be financed by debt that would be paid off through rent generated by the new housing, Chow said.

She said her plan would also rely on $300 million from federal partnership programs which have billions of dollars set aside for housing.

Mitzie Hunter was also talking housing Monday, unveiling a five-point plan which she said would also leverage city property to build more affordable housing.

Hunter said she would also add rental apartments on major streets and near campuses, speed up building approvals and construction, add protections for renters and existing affordable housing, and add Montreal-style low-rise multiplexes of up to four units to fill the “missing middle.”

She said her plan would deliver nearly 22,700 new units of purpose-built, below-market rate rental over six years through a new a new Toronto Affordable Housing Corporation (TAHC).

“We can do this, we must do it,” Hunter said. “And if we are to have a city that works for everyone, everywhere, we must grow the supply of affordable housing for renters and owners alike, and not just hope creating the conditions for that is enough.”

Meanwhile Ana Bailão said she would prohibit lane closures on Richmond, Adelaide, and Dundas streets, between Bay and Victoria, until Ontario Line construction is over.

Bailão also said she would drop fares to just $2 for replacement buses when the Scarborough RT is decommissioned. She said the lower fare would be in effect until a dedicated busway is built in the path of the RT. She would also lower fares to $2 on the 501 Queen streetcar as long as it reroutes to Dundas instead of Adelaide during Ontario Line construction.

She said she would also expedite construction work across the TTC, including the rollout of cellular service on the line.

Anthonie Furey was in Scarborough Monday, pitching a “Buy-and-Hire Toronto” procurement policy. If elected, he said, the city would require municipal projects to favour Toronto suppliers and manufacturers and to favour Toronto workers and apprentices for all municipal projects.

Furey said the city would also sponsor an annual Jobs Fair to match apprentices with industry and Toronto suppliers with buyers.