Three more candidates announce Toronto mayoral runs

Three more Toronto mayoral hopefuls have tossed their hats in the race for the city's top job this week.

Coun. Josh Matlow, former Toronto police chief Mark Saunders, and former Toronto Sun columnist Anthony Furey announced their pitches to take the top job in Toronto within hours of one another.

Matlow, Ward 12 Toronto—St. Paul's councillor, said in an open letter Tuesday morning that Toronto City Hall’s leadership “has [long] held this city back from reaching its full potential.”

“We have all seen the decline. The snow is not cleared on time, public washrooms are dirty, if they’re even open, and garbage bins are broken and overflowing,” Matlow wrote in the letter.

“The past decade of leadership has kept taxes artificially low by starving the services that made Toronto the incredible city I grew up in,” he continued.

If elected, Matlow said he will launch the ‘City Works Fund’ – a property tax that will cost homeowners an average of $67 a year, raising over $390 million dollars over five years. He said the funding will be earmarked for services such as transit, public libraries, warming centres, and road and park maintenance.

Matlow has served at Toronto City Hall since his election in the since-eradicated Ward 22- St. Paul's in 2010.

On Tuesday, Matlow signed off his open letter stating that "another Toronto is possible."

As a city columnist for more than a decade, Furey said he will bring a “fresh perspective” to city hall.

He said he sees his past career experience as a natural progression towards running for mayor.

“I feel like the status quo voices that got us to this place are not the ones to get us out of it,” Furey told CP24 Tuesday morning.

Furey said he wants hockey moms and small and medium business owners to be directing the city’s agenda instead of lobbyists, big corporations, and fringe activists.

Saunders entered his name in the race on Monday night after hinting last week he was “strongly considering” running.

He served as Toronto’s police chief from 2015 until his resignation in the summer of 2020 when he joined Ford government’s COVID-19 vaccine task force.

The Toronto byelection is scheduled for June 26.

With files from CTV Toronto's Natalie Johnson.