[AlvinofDiaspar]

Slightly off topic question; But with so much focus on affordable housing; Does the province mandate the other communities build affordable housing, let's take Markham as an example ? Or is it completely on the city (because "all the services" are there, which strikes me as a self fulfilling prophecy type of statement).

The province more or less washed their hands off the delivery of affordable housing in any systematic way since the Harris era.

AoD

 

[bowen]

Two more weeks until the election.

There is a lot of speculation that some of the lower polling candidates will drop out and endorse the bigger contenders.

Personally, I don’t expect this to happen.

Hard to believe, but the start of the 2026 municipal election campaign is less than 3 years away. And it’s reasonable to assume a number of the unsuccessful Mayoral candidates will leverage their profile from this race to run again in 2026. Or at least keep that option open depending on how the balance of this Council term goes under the next Mayor’s leadership.

And if you’re thinking of a 2026 run, you’ve got to ask yourself:

A) Do I want to potentially run against someone I recently endorsed.
B) Do I want there to be a strong second place finisher in 2023 that becomes a presumed, front-running challenger in 2026.
C) With advance voting already started, do I want to potentially alienate the supporters that came out early to vote for me.

And if you’re even thinking of running again in 2026, the answer to all of the above is likely no. And so you stay in the race and do your best to the end.

Just my thoughts. Could be 100% wrong!

 

[DSC]

This is the latest on the CP24 online 'poll'. I think there are no controls on multi-'voting' so it is not worth the paper it's (not) printed on but ..

 

[DSC]

From Blog TO. https://www.blogto.com/city/2023/06/toronto-mayoral-candidate-chris-sky-arrested/

Perhaps the most divisive of the 100+ candidates running for mayor of Toronto this month was apparently arrested this morning, at least according to his own accounts on social media, which cite a "personal direct attack" against him from the "deep state."

Chris Saccoccia, the famed disruptive COVID denier conspiracy theorist also known as Chris Sky, tweeted one of his characteristic selfie-facing videos on Monday afternoon saying that he was being forced to turn himself in to be arrested for the 27th time and charged for the 73rd time.

He is, of course, using the situation as a PR stunt to encourage people to vote for him, posting additional videos as he drove to and arrived at Toronto Police Service's 53rd Division around 5:15 a.m. today.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

From Blog TO. https://www.blogto.com/city/2023/06/toronto-mayoral-candidate-chris-sky-arrested/

Perhaps the most divisive of the 100+ candidates running for mayor of Toronto this month was apparently arrested this morning, at least according to his own accounts on social media, which cite a "personal direct attack" against him from the "deep state."

Chris Saccoccia, the famed disruptive COVID denier conspiracy theorist also known as Chris Sky, tweeted one of his characteristic selfie-facing videos on Monday afternoon saying that he was being forced to turn himself in to be arrested for the 27th time and charged for the 73rd time.

He is, of course, using the situation as a PR stunt to encourage people to vote for him, posting additional videos as he drove to and arrived at Toronto Police Service's 53rd Division around 5:15 a.m. today.

At this point our justice system is a joke.

AoD

 

[adma]

Something I find interesting is how some of those lower-tier candidates that were once spoken of in terms of potential "viability" or at least "profile" have fallen *completely* off radar--Perruzza, Mammo, CCC, Rob Davis, Frank D'Angelo etc...

And hate to say it, but Gong could wind up doing better than any of them.

 

[Pacer]

Something I find interesting is how some of those lower-tier candidates that were once spoken of in terms of potential "viability" or at least "profile" have fallen *completely* off radar--Perruzza, Mammo, CCC, Rob Davis, Frank D'Angelo etc...

And hate to say it, but Gong could wind up doing better than any of them.

I think Rob Davis will pick up a few thousand votes just on the bike lane issue.

The way Perruzza has bombed is even larger than I thought was possible. I wouldn't be surprised if he is one of the few candidates to endorse another, just for the airtime.

 

[christiesplits]

Something I find interesting is how some of those lower-tier candidates that were once spoken of in terms of potential "viability" or at least "profile" have fallen *completely* off radar--Perruzza, Mammo, CCC, Rob Davis, Frank D'Angelo etc...

And hate to say it, but Gong could wind up doing better than any of them.

I'm curious how well Gong will perform in Scarborough North and Scarborough Agincourt. I wonder if he can crack the Top 3 in these wards?

 

[adma]

I think Rob Davis will pick up a few thousand votes just on the bike lane issue.

He *could*; but I think a lot of that vote's likelier to be herded into the Saunders/Furey camp at this point.

And at this point, you might as well also throw Chloe Brown in with the "redundant".

 

[taal]

This is the latest on the CP24 online 'poll'. I think there are no controls on multi-'voting' so it is not worth the paper it's (not) printed on but ..

View attachment 484951

I really do not understand the results of this survey.

How exactly is the city supposed to make housing more affordable ? I highly doubt the folks filling out this poll are ones that are qualifying for any form of subsidized housing. So given this, again, what is the city supposed to do that is in their power ? In fact maybe they're already doing it ? I'm fairly sure many 905 communities have higher average house prices at this point, a lot of this is because "undesirable" (for lack of a better word) areas of Toronto tend to have a much lower housing costs which drags the overall average down. Make it easier to build condos ? There's really no evidence this has been able to reduce costs.

You probably should ask for an increase in crime as that'll likely make the suburbs more desirable and drive down prices further.

 

[Northern Light]

A FB media push by Bradford:

Really? 1/2 the lighting is turned out..........and there are no passengers.........uh huh.......

 

[Northern Light]

I really do not understand the results of this survey.

How exactly is the city supposed to make housing more affordable ? I highly doubt the folks filling out this poll are ones that are qualifying for any form of subsidized housing. So given this, again, what is the city supposed to do that is in their power ? In fact maybe they're already doing it ? I'm fairly sure many 905 communities have higher average house prices at this point, a lot of this is because "undesirable" (for lack of a better word) areas of Toronto tend to have a much lower housing costs which drags the overall average down. Make it easier to build condos ? There's really no evidence this has been able to reduce costs.

You probably should ask for an increase in crime as that'll likely make the suburbs more desirable and drive down prices further.

First, I don't want to defend a nonsense survey...........but.....

The City certainly does have options.........like Vienna it can build housing itself.

It can also choose to rent at non-profit or even a loss.......... which would obviously put pressure on private landlords, if the units were built in sufficient numbers.

Its expensive, it would not be 'free'........but it can be done.

There are other options as well, but I think the point here is identifying voter concerns.........

Like when you identify healthcare as a concern, you don't expect the premier to be your doctor, or personally recruit or pay for same.

But the province does have options to reduce wait times.

 

[GenerationW]

Voted at an advance poll today. It was busier than I expected, for whatever that's worth.

 

[taal]

First, I won't want to defend a nonsense survey...........but.....

The City certainly does have options.........like Vienna it can be build housing itself.

It can also choose to rent at non-profit or even a loss.......... which would obviously put pressure on private landlords, if the units were built in sufficient numbers.

Its expensive, it would not be 'free'........but it can be done.

There are other options as well, but I think the point here is identifying voter concerns.........

Like when you identify healthcare as a concern, you don't expect the premier to be your doctor, or personally recruit or pay for same.

But the province does have options to reduce wait times.

That's fair, but realistically, do you think any of those options would actually happen, to touch on one in particular you called out:

It can also choose to rent at non-profit or even a loss.......... which would obviously put pressure on private landlords, if the units were built in sufficient numbers.

If you include debt repayment (aka a mortgage, whether it's a city/province or end-user, this is typically a factor) and operating costs (e.g. condo fees ... really maintenance, both short and longer term) I suspect many people are just "breaking-even" who rent properties - what I mean is I challenge the notion that "no-profit" rents would be substantially cheaper if cheaper at all given building costs ... so really this would need to be subsided and we already have a scheme for that being the TCHC, so you seem to be arguing to expand this significantly. I actually have no problem with that at all, but it should not be something the city of Toronto needs to bear alone, it should be funded from the rest of the GTA, the province, and federally ... but I see no appetite for this at those levels ...

 

[Northern Light]

If you include debt repayment (aka a mortgage, whether it's a city/province or end-user, this is typically a factor) and operating costs (e.g. condo fees ... really maintenance, both short and longer term) I suspect many people are just "breaking-even" who rent properties - what I mean is I challenge the notion that "no-profit" rents would be substantially cheaper if cheaper at all given building costs

The City's current {and not successful) program model is Housing Now; in this model, the City already owns the land, and there is no cost for that, and only for construction; depending on how you choose to finance construction this isn't as difficult as it looks; and it really can't be compared to a retail investor in condos who is first paying a developer's mark up; who typically lacks significant scale; and then on top of that has private financing costs. Very different base model.

When I think of pressuring landlords I'm thinking of large REITS who hold tens of thousands of apartments. Now most of those don't show a nominally huge ROI either; but that's because they keep remortgaging fully paid for properties in order to buy more. If they had kept properties mortgage-free that were paid off by the year 2000, you looked at their rental revenue to cost, most are actually in a very good ROI position.

... so really this would need to be subsided and we already have a scheme for that being the TCHC, so you seem to be arguing to expand this significantly.

My preferred model is the Vienna model.

Vienna’s Unique Social Housing Program | HUD USER

www.huduser.gov

So its not like TCHC in that the government buys the land; it then eats a portion of the construction cost from cashflow on other projects; the balance is financed in some fashion, but the developments are mixed income
including market rents, non-profit rents and deeply subsidized rents, with the former generally mostly offsetting the cost of the latter.

Vienna historically used revenue from a Housing Tax as the seed capital to build public housing; which now represents more than 1/4 of all housing in Vienna. There is also tough rental regulation on a lot of the remaining housing.

I actually have no problem with that at all, but it should not be something the city of Toronto needs to bear alone, it should be funded from the rest of the GTA, the province, and federally ... but I see no appetite for this at those levels ...

While I strongly support senior levels of gov't helping out, lets have a look at some math on what's possible.

Lets assume you try for something that looks a bit like the Vienna model.

So Toronto will either use existing land it already owns, or it will go out and purchase land, probably (if they have an iota of sense) that's zoned neighbourhoods, and buy several blocks and upzone it; and then write off the land cost in any development.

So you then have the cost of construction.

For argument's sake, lets set that at 350k per unit excluding land costs and any profit.

That would mean an investment of 1B per year would produce just over 2,800 units per year. Certainly not enough, but not nothing, That's 28,000 units over 10 years; which if serving households in line with Toronto's average household size would serve ~70,000 people.

Toronto's annual budget is ~16B.

Only a portion of that is funded by property tax; but if you think of adding 1B in net new revenue; you're talking about 6.2% more than what the City takes in now.

For comparison's sake, there are roughly 140,000 cars that use the Gardiner Expressway each day, and about 135,000 use the DVP; there is some overlap, but not that much.

So lets say there are 220,000 distinct cars (guess); If you charged each a $5 toll each way or $10 daily; you would raise 2.2M every weekday, ignoring weekend revenue just for the moment; that would bring in close to 600M per year.

An all-classes property tax hike of 4% would make up the balance and you don't even need debt.

That's not to suggest this is how you would do it or should do it; I would prefer a mix of direct subsidies from the province/feds; as well as CMHC financing; but the point is that just sitting on one's proverbial hands waiting for senior gov'ts to move is not strictly necessary.

I would add, my 350k in pure construction cost is pretty high; if you're excluding financing; but I did that purposefully to low-ball what could be achieved.

Honestly, when I look at the opportunities though......I think the gov't (feds/province) should maybe look at buying a couple of the REITs outright, and then convert them to non-profit land trusts, that would shake the market quite nicely.

CAPREIT owns something like 67,000 units nation wide; at a current market cap of 8.4B; buying it out works out to $125,000 a unit; that's a pretty sweet-heart price.

Other REITs are even cheaper per unit.