Olivia Chow Or Brad Bradford for Mayor, Who Does Life In The 6 Endorse ?
Here at Life In The 6 we are not Liberals, NDP, or Progressive Conservative. We believe the the best person for the job will not always come from one single party, so having said that lets see where the candidates land.
Lets start with the incumbent Olivia Chow
Work History
• Constituent Assistant: Worked as an assistant to federal MP Dan Heap in the 1980s, learning grassroots politics and campaign strategy.
• ESL Teacher & Settlement Worker: Taught English as a Second Language (ESL) and helped new immigrants and refugees settle in Toronto.
• Refugee Advocate: Advocated for the acceptance and sponsorship of Vietnamese boat people and other displaced families
• Toronto Board of Education Trustee (1985–1991) Served two terms, focusing on anti-discrimination, school nutrition programs, and child care.
• Toronto City Councilor / Metro Councilor (1991–2005) Served four terms on Toronto City Council and Metro Council, championing public transit, free dental care for children, and social services.
• Member of Parliament for Trinity—Spadina (2006–2014) Elected to the House of Commons; served as an NDP critic for portfolios including Transport, Citizenship and Immigration, and Human Resources, and introduced private member’s bills on national child care and public transit.
• Mayor of Toronto (2023–Present) Elected in a June 2023 mayoral by-election, becoming the first woman elected mayor post-amalgamation and the first racialized mayor of Toronto.
As Mayor
Secured a tripartite deal with the provincial and federal governments to purchase new subway cars for Line 2 built in Canada. Embedded mental health crisis workers and police on the TTC, and hired over 400 frontline safety and support staff.
Initiated dozens of major affordable and supportive housing projects (aiming to build homes for 30,000 residents), instituted renoviction bylaws. Introduced luxury home taxes on properties over $3 million, and moved thousands of people from shelters into permanent housing using housing benefits.
Negotiated a financial “New Deal” agreement with the Government of Ontario. In order to help stabilize Toronto’s multi-billion dollar budget deficit, and secure funding for key infrastructure like Ontario Place and public transit.
Expanded universal school meal and nutrition programs to hundreds of schools, and scaled up public library and 911 dispatch support.
Implemented property tax adjustments (including increases in 2024, 2025, and 2026) alongside a City Building Fund levy to pay for core services and infrastructure.
Campaign Promises
Weekly TTC Fare Capping: Capping TTC fares so that transit becomes free after 10 paid trips in a week, alongside a TTC fare freeze in 2027.
Building 65,000 affordable and rent-controlled homes, with incentives to get shovels in the ground on 10,000 new rental units in 2027.
Creating a dedicated task force within Rent Safe TO with a $2.15 million annual budget to crack down on neglected and poorly maintained apartment buildings.
Implementing a moratorium on new data centers to protect local resources and energy grids.
Holding property tax increases “at or around” the rate of inflation after fixing the city’s budget deficit during her first term.
Expanding property-tax discounts for independent grocers to help lower consumer food prices.
Expanding school meal programs to all 764+ schools with a goal of achieving a universal program by 2030, saving families money on groceries.
Keeping all 100 public libraries open 7 days a week, expanding evening hours, and creating more youth hubs and anti-violence
Continuing to hire and deploy more frontline police officers and crisis/emergency workers.
Cost Of Promises
TTC fare cap (free after 10 paid weekly rides) is estimated to cost $12.2 million. The $12.2 million is projected to be covered by funds already allocated in Toronto’s budget for expanded fare capping.
Building 65,000 affordable and rent-controlled homes, the cost for this is dependent on the supply and demand in the housing market. Most of the costs with this program will be associated with reduced costs the developer will have to pay the city.
Creating a dedicated task force within Rent Safe TO with a $2.15 million annual budget
Expanding property-tax discounts for independent grocers, we’ve estimated the cost of this program to be 22.5 million. The policy targets approximately 450 independent grocery stores, with an expected savings of 5000 per store.
Expanding school meal programs to all 764+ schools with a goal of achieving a universal program by 2030 will be fazed in over the next 4 years. Expected costs at this time are unknown.
Expanding all 100 Toronto Public Library branches to operate 7 days a week year round would cost an additional $8 million.
Now the Challenger Brad Bradford
Work History
• Office of Chief Planner Jennifer Keesmaat, City of Toronto. Worked as an urban planner inside Toronto City Hall.
• Elected in 2018 as a Toronto City Councilor in Ward 19 Beaches East York, and re-elected for a second term, serving as councilor.
• Planning and Housing Committee, Served as Chair of the committee.
• Budget Committee: Served as Vice-Chair.
• TTC Commission, Served as a Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) Commissioner.
• Board Memberships: Served on boards including CreateTO, Build Toronto, Toronto Parking Authority, TPLC, and the Hockey Hall of Fame.
As A Councilor
He was a driving force behind council motions to unlock zoning permissions across Toronto. Easing approvals for multiplexes, lane way suites, garden suites, and converting office spaces to residential units.
He successfully advocated for streamlining modular and rapid-build construction approvals and removing the restrictive “wedding cake” angular plane rules to encourage more mid-rise building designs.
Campaign Promises
Bradford will take his seat on the Toronto Police Service Board that is reserved for the mayor, and hire 1,000 new front-line police officers over his first term.
Bradford is promising to cut Torontonians’ water bills by 25 per cent by making Toronto Water a public agency.
He’s also pledged to freeze property taxes for one year and cut the land transfer tax for homes under $1.1 million.
He will remove the Bloor Street West bike lanes in Etobicoke (from South Kingsway to Resurrection Road)
Bradford will launch the Toronto Youth Employment Challenge to create 15,000 permanent full-time jobs for young people.
Cost Of Promises
Estimated cost of one thousand new police officers is approximately $ 143 million. With baseline salaries that range from $ 77,594 for a cadet to $ 123,198 for a constable plus, training, equipment, and benefits. This seems like an expensive promise, for an nonexistent issue.
Brad Bradford is proposing to restructure Toronto Water into a publicly owned utility modeled after Toronto Hydro and cut water bills by 25 per cent. The fear here is the utility will become profit driven.
The combined cost to freeze property taxes for one year and cut the land transfer tax for homes under $1.1 million, is approximately $ 427 million. The estimated cost of waving the Land Transfer Tax on the first 1.1 million of a homes purchase price is expected to cost 300 million, and the cost of freezing residential property tax for a year is expected to cost $ 127 million.
Bradford has promised to remove the Bloor Street West bike lanes in Etobicoke, and protect the rest. The problem here is he originally voted in favor of the lanes on Bloor West, so in our opinion that means he can’t be trusted on this promise.
Launching the Toronto Youth Employment Challenge in order to create 15,000 permanent full-time jobs for young people, would lean heavily on private sector investment. The cost to the taxpayer should be minimal
Bradford accuses Chow of mishandling taxpayer money, and calls for line by line
“Toronto isn’t struggling because you don’t pay enough. Mayor Chow has raised your taxes plenty. City Hall is struggling because nobody is minding the books,” he said.
“When you get more money, in terms of federal and provincial transfers than ever before, and you still have to go out to taxpayers and ask them for a record-breaking tax increase, that’s not a revenue problem, that’s an accountability and management problem.”
When he said this I thought about the last time that I heard about a line by line review of the city budget, was with Rob Ford. They called it, The Core Services Review it can be found HERE, Rob Ford then promised a billion in savings. It was closer to 16 million, as it turned out the things that it suggested to cut would have been political suicide.
Our Conclusion
Our opinion is that Brad Bradford is not fighting this mayor race based on policy but based on fear, as seen in his approach. We feel that Olivia Chow has demonstrated with both her career and her voting record an approach that we here at Life In The 6 appreciate. So for what It’s worth Life In The 6 endorses Olivia Chow
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