Olivia Chow under fire over property taxes as mayoral rivals try to shake her lead in the polls

Olivia Chow, the former MP who polls say is on track to become Toronto’s next mayor, came under intense fire Wednesday over her refusal to say exactly how much she would raise property taxes next year.

Chow seemed unfazed as rivals accused her, during a debate hosted by the Toronto Star, Toronto Metropolitan University and the United Way of Greater Toronto, of trying to fool voters and risk worsening the city’s affordability crisis.

“There’s no plan, there’s no transparency and I think Torontonians deserve better when they select their mayor,” former Liberal MPP Mitzie Hunter scolded Chow, a line of attack repeated by former police chief Mark Saunders, former city councillor Ana Bailão, Coun. Brad Bradford and Coun. Josh Matlow.

The new mayor will face a $1.5-billion budget gap for last year and this year, with billions more in pandemic costs and revenue shortfalls during their term until 2026.

Chow, a former Toronto and Metro councillor, said city leaders in recent years have failed residents by starting with a tax hike to make the budget work, rather than identifying needs, tallying provincial funding and checking the inflation rate.

When Bailão pressed Chow for a number — demanding “what is the ceiling?” — Chow shot back, “To pick a number’s not a fair way to do it.” If Bailão needed a number, Chow added, they could talk about “zero shovels in the ground” from the Housing Now affordable housing program that Bailão led on city council.

Chow said her property tax hike would be “modest” and noted as mayor she would also raise the city’s tax on vacant homes and increase the land transfer tax on sales over $3 million, adding: “I am known to be good at budgeting.”

Bradford shot back: “You are known to be good at rocketing taxes,” while Saunders told Chow that voters “are afraid of you being the mayor.”

Asked for the June 26 mayoral byelection’s key issue, Saunders cited public safety; Hunter said affordability; Matlow said “a city that works”; Chow said “better living conditions and more social supports”; Bradford said “endless debate, deferral and delay” at city hall; and Bailão said affordability including housing.

Asked how they would protect renters being priced out of Toronto, Hunter touted her plan to boost affordable housing supply and promised to increase city grants to renew and retrofit highrises in which many low-income people live.

She also promised “student zones” with rent controls around campuses.

Matlow said he’d initiate the construction of housing with rent controls on city property, provide rental supplements to people so they don’t have to go to “unsafe” city shelters.

Chow promised new financial and social supports for renters, funds to fight “bad landlords” and supports for tenants who want to jointly turn a building into a co-op or land trust.

Bradford said since he became housing chair last fall, council has legalized rooming houses and multiplexes across Toronto, vowing to cut bureaucracy and approval times for new housing projects.

Noting Bradford has been on city council since 2018, Chow demanded: “If you can’t get that (housing) work done why would you deserve a promotion?”

Bailão, Bradford’s predecessor on the housing file, accused him of trying to take credit for initiatives she had under way. She promised a freeze on the demolition of rental buildings and construction of 57,000 new purpose-built rental units.

Saunders, the only non-politician on the stage, blamed his rivals for the current housing crisis, vowing to free up rentals by reducing housing project approval times to one year from the current three to five years.

When moderator Edward Keenan, a Star columnist, asked each candidate to answer, in one word, if they would use strong mayor powers to overrule the majority will of city council, only Bradford and Saunders said: “Yes.”

Premier Doug Ford, while not officially part of the mayoral race, was invoked several times. The former councillor and Progressive Conservative leader, who has intervened in a host of city issues, has said he thinks Saunders would make a “great” mayor.

Saunders said Toronto, which has limited funding on its own, needs a mayor who can get along with Queen’s Park and Parliament Hill.

Bailão said voters should choose her experience with housing plans and track record negotiating with other governments over “Olivia Chow, politics of opposition, tax and spend” or “Mark Saunders, puppet of Doug Ford.”

In closing remarks, Matlow said of Chow: “I like her, she has an amazing legacy but the contemporary challenges that we are having to address right now, are different” and “Doug Ford is a bully.”

David Rider is the Star’s City Hall bureau chief and a reporter covering city hall and municipal politics. Follow him on Twitter: @dmrider

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