What’s at stake for Toronto in the Ontario election

Steam rises as people look out on Lake Ontario in front of the skyline during extreme cold weather in Toronto on Saturday, February 13, 2016. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Mark Blinch

Ontario voters are heading to the polls to choose a new provincial government, but in many ways that choice will also have a significant impact on life in the GTA.

From highways and subways, to housing and shelters, the province has wide jurisdiction over a number of elements that are central to the life of the city.

In Toronto, a major subway expansion plan is already underway, funded largely by the province. There is also a process unfolding to upload the Gardiner Expressway and the Don Valley Parkway (DVP) to the province as part of a new deal for the city.

While Doug Ford’s government has coughed up billions of dollars of investment for Toronto, there have also been concerns around what some see as a lack of respect for local democracy.

Ford halved the size of Toronto City Council in the middle of a municipal election back in 2018. He also went ahead with a plan to redevelop Ontario Place into a waterpark and spa in a process which the auditor general found was deeply flawed and lacked consultation.

When it comes to housing, the province decided to do away with many of the development charges that municipalities levied to pay for growth.

Most recently the province decided to unilaterally pass legislation to rip up some bike lanes in Toronto and prohibit all municipalities from installing new ones on arterial roads without provincial review.

But despite the fact that the premier has faced stiff public opposition to some of those moves, they may not be front and centre for voters, experts say.

“I’m not sure it’s on the ballot,” says John Shields, a professor emeritus in the Department of Politics & Public Administration at Toronto Metropolitan University. “It seems like the only thing that Ford has on the ballot is the tariffs, really.”

Voter attention divided

Shields points out that there seems to be broad consensus from the party leaders, all hailing from around the GTA, that the city needs investment in key infrastructure like transit.

“The problem is, I think just trying to get the attention of voters right now, because this is a really overcrowded issue landscape with what’s happening at the federal level, what’s happening with Trump south of the border, what’s happening on the international scale – that’s kind of taking up a lot of the political oxygen,” he says.

“And so it’s been hard, I think, for the opposition parties in Ontario to get attention placed on these issues. Obviously the people in Toronto, like the rest of the province, are feeling the effects of the housing and affordability crisis, the healthcare crisis, but it hasn’t really kind of gelled in a particular way that it’s really hurt the premier.”

CTV News Political Commentator Scott Reid agrees.

“It’s the most ‘nothing happened’ campaign that we’ve seen in decades,” he says.

He points out that even Mayor Olivia Chow, “a dyed-in-the-wool New Democrat,” has found common ground with Ford and is not actively working to oppose him.

“From a position of political self-interest, she’s risk-evaluated the options and concluded that this campaign is unworthy of her intervention against the incumbent,” Reid says. “From her perspective, a combination of the fact that her intervention probably isn’t going to change the results, and that she’s actually not that disturbed by the result.”

He points out that unlike the situation in the province decades ago, there now seems to be a “broad consensus” that Toronto needs the sort of funding that is being provided.

“The difference between the City of Toronto’s relationship with the Mike Harris conservatives and the Doug Ford conservatives can be summed up in a simple phrase; downloading versus uploading,” Reid says. “Ford has uploaded and effectively purchased the peace with the City of Toronto. Mike Harris did the opposite, and he purchased enmity.”

He points to the new deal to upload the DVP and Gardiner Express.

“When Ontario Place was really starting to rock and roll as a political issue and a potential vulnerability for Doug Ford, suddenly there was an upload.”

While one recent survey has the Liberals around seven points ahead of the PCs in Toronto, both Shields and Reid say that’s to be expected in a city that tends to lean left, politically speaking, and the PCs still remain well ahead in most other parts of the province.

“The Conservatives may come up with less seats than they had before. It’s quite possible,” Shields says. However he adds that defeating them altogether would be “a big ask” from a broader electorate who don’t appear motivated to change government at the moment.

“There’s a lot of, I think under-the-surface discontent, but you’ve got to have a catalyst to make it into something that’s going to work at the electoral level,” Shields says. “And I think getting that together is what’s been a bit of a challenge in this environment where there is an overcrowded issue landscape.”

Asked about her thoughts on the election this week, Mayor Chow said the city has a number of areas where it wants Queen’s Park to help out.

“We at the City of Toronto have a list of things that we want; supporting TTC, for example. So getting Toronto moving, feeding more kids and building more affordable housing faster. We’ve been saying that at every council meeting,” Chow said. “So whoever gets elected, partner with us.”

She did not express a preference around the outcome.

Civic groups pressing changes

While the issues landscape might be crowded, various groups are trying to make sure municipal matters don’t fall through the cracks.

Transit advocacy group TTCriders recently held a demonstration to draw attention to the fact that the Eglinton Crosstown LRT project, headed up by provincial transit agency Metrolinx, has been under construction for more than a decade and there is still no opening date.

“You know it’s been over 13 years since construction on the Crosstown started and we don’t have answers about why it’s been so delayed, and that’s a big problem,” TTCriders Executive Director Shelagh Pizey-Allen told CP24.

The group is asking all provincial candidates to sign on to a pledge to have the TTC run transit in Toronto. They also want to see candidates commit to operational funding for the TTC, which is mainly funded through fares.

Other GTA groups have a list of wants as well. Metamorphosis, a non-profit network in Peel Region, argues the province underfunds services in the region and is urging all candidates to pledge a commitment to providing money for social services in Peel.

Meanwhile ACORN Canada, a national network of community organizations, is calling on all parties to implement full rent control, along with a suite of other measures to improve life for renters.

What are parties promising?

While President Donald Trump’s tariff threats may have stolen the spotlight, that’s not to say the parties are not putting anything on the table when it come to municipal issues.

The NDP are promising to upload shelter costs and homelessness prevention programs to the province, and to cancel the spa and waterpark deal at Ontario Place while reopening a revitalized Ontario Science Centre in its current location.

When it comes to housing, both the Liberals and the Greens say they would waive the land transfer tax for first-time homebuyers, while the NDP say they would extend rent control to all buildings.

The PCs are promising to double down on transit expansion with an expanded GO 2.0 plan for the Go Train network, as well as a massive tunnel under the 401 to relieve congestion for commuters – though there is still no cost estimate attached.

The Liberals have committed to installing platform barriers at all TTC stations, though that promise has not been costed in their platform either.

There are more promises around widening highways, fixing crumbling schools and increasing zoning densities in urban areas. You can see a more detailed breakdown of some of the promises the parties are making using our Promise Tracker.