City Hall Watcher

Happy Monday. There are 35 days left until election day. While we wait, City Hall Watcher has yet another bit of nerdy data analysis for you. Did you ever wonder which councillors speak the most…

👟 If you haven’t played SimCouncillor yet, try it out — and find your match on Toronto Council. Hey there! Back to the usual this week after last week’s milestone issue party. Though Issue #401 comes with a pretty notable number, too. Maybe we should bury it. Even if it costs $100 billion, let’s put this issue in a tunnel. But anyway, in addition to jok…

Four hundred issues. Four hundred! I know I say this at everymilestone, but it really is just so enormously cool that this little indie newsletter has been able to survive and grow and thrive like it has. Thank you for reading and supporting this work. You wouldn’t necessarily think there’d be such a strong market for a hyper-obsessed municipal government newsletter that routinely runs thousands of words each week, but then I suppose we’re all mad here.

Welcome to the 399th edition of City Hall Watcher. It’s the one before the milestone celebration. But there’s still reason to get excited. In this issue, Andrey’s got answers to a question I’ve seen a few people ask over the last few months: what, exactly, did Mayor Olivia Chow’s property tax increases over the last three years pay for? It turns out a big chunk of the money went to policing. We’ve got a look at whether that’s been effective spending, and whether it’s sustainable.

No turning back now. The nomination period for Toronto’s 2026 municipal election ended at 2 p.m. Friday. By the numbers, we’ve got 53 people running for mayor and 190 running for Council. There are also some people running for school board trustee, probably. There are no take-backs. Candidates can suspend their campaigns between now and October 26, but their names will remain on the ballot regardless. The field is locked. So, uh, who’s going to win?

The power is yours. In this issue, we’ve got the seventh edition of the annual COUNCIL POWER RANKINGS. A recurring feature that always hurts some feelings — sorry in advance — it ranks all 26 members of Toronto Council based on their ability to make waves over the last year. Find out where your councillor ranks. Each entry combines data about council att…

City Hall has gone quiet, but there’s still much to discuss. In this issue, we’ve got a fresh edition of LOBBYIST WATCH, featuring some notable moves from lobbyists in response to City Hall debates on airport expansion, surveillance pricing and data centres. Plus: some odour tech, of course. We’ve also got notes on the people meeting with the traffic cza…

Council capped off the 2022-2026 term last week, completing their monster of a July meeting agenda in just two days. It had the potential to be a real mega-disaster of a meeting, but councillors — eager to close the book on this term and put their focus on the election — were relatively well-behaved and generally in agree…

Buckle your darn seatbelt and hold on for dear life. Toronto Council is set to meet this week for the final time of the 2022-2026 term. The agenda is a monstrosity — 396 items up for consideration, including 83 member motions. And that number will only grow as councillors scramble during the meeting to get motions passed before they turn their attention…

Welcome! Things are looking less post-apocalyptic this week, which is an improvement. I’d rather live in the pre-apocalypse, I think. Because it’s summer, this week I am kicking back and letting some others do the work. Damien Moule has taken a look at Toronto’s famously slow streetcar system and why several supposed “silver bullet” fixes have generally missed the target.