Also: a quick look at how Mayor Olivia Chow’s office might approach toda…

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With so much up for consideration, I’m here to help. I’ve got a complete preview of the agenda, focusing on some of the more newsworthy and notable items. …

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There’s little on the agenda this week, and Mayor Olivia Chow’s schedule shows “No Public Events” today.

To fill the silence, I decided to build a process to analyze the last six months of purchase data on the City’…

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Tory confirmed as much last week, via an overlong statement. I’m confirming the same for me right now, via an overlong newsletter. Two peas in a pod, really.

Anyway, to properly close the book on Tory’s story, today’s issue includes an update of the COUNCIL SCORECARD …

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While we wait, here’s LOBBYIST WATCH. It’s got tales of a mayoral meeting, the potential development of a troubled apartment building, and a credit card company’s EV charging tech. Also: a lot of AI. A whole lot.

Let’s get right into it.

— Matt Elliott

graphicmatt@gmail.com / Ar…

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But they’re not the only heartbreaking thing. Politics can also pack a heart-wrenching punch, especially if you end up on the losing end.

To unpack the idea of losing a bit, this issue features the second iteration of what I’ve dubbed the COUNCIL DEFEATABILITY INDEX. It’s my attempt to quantify whi…

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But some things, at least, are firmly behind us! Like the City budget process. It wrapped up last week with a Council meeting. In this issue, I’ve got your complete recap, including the most quotable quotes, most votiest votes an…

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In this issue,…

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Instead, let’s do LOBBYIST WATCH. I’ve got a rundown of all the activity on City Hall’s lobbyist registry in January, with notes on Waymo’s Toronto tendency, some trouble at the old yacht club and more.

Plus: Mayor Olivia Chow has unveiled her new version of the b…

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If you’re looking for something to read in between shovelling sessions, I’ve brought you a municipal government newsletter. I’ve got the latest on the City budget process, an update to the Council Scorecard app with some new votes and a bunch of new housing data, plus… a seabus? C…

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In this issue, I’ve got a look at some tidbits and notes from the City’s draft spending plan, with a special focus on the ever-growing police budget, the question of whether this budget raids the reser…

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Also in this issue: the police board consid…

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…

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As is City Hall Watcher’s custom, today I’ve got a special year-end edition: the year in charts. I’ve combed through the archives for this newsletter’s seventh year and selected charts that define the issues we've covered. It’s a nerdy walk down memory lane.

A special year-end thank you to all who help keep this project going. I’m enormously grateful that this gets to be my job. Your continued readership and support are amazing, and I’ll never take this for granted.

If you’re not yet a paid subscriber, maybe 2026 is the year to give it a try. It’s an election year. The stakes will be high. The news will be relentless. City Hall Watcher, with its frothy mix of data and news and jokes, might help you get through it.

Subscribe now

✨ This issue runs a bit long. (There are a lot of charts!) If it gets cut off in your email client, you can read it on the web.

— Matt Elliott

graphicmatt@gmail.com / Archives / Subscribe

2025: the year in charts

Previous years, in charts: 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024.

January

The year started with a recap of all the municipal lobbying in 2024. Kim Wright took the top spot. Did she wear the crown again this year? We’ll find out soon.

The budget process occupied the rest of the month. I did a nice job putting a proposed 6.9% residential property tax increase into context. I also looked at City Hall’s reserve funds, where the cash continues to pile up despite some efforts to spend more of the money.

But the undisputed highlight of the month was David Hains’ very triumphant return to municipal politics punditry, with an updated version of his piece explaining how property taxes work. Worth re-reading in advance of the coming 2026 budget.

February

I looked at increases in the number of cyclists by month, showing an increased number of winter warriors. Speaking of warriors, the threat of U.S. tariffs ended up overshadowing Council’s budget debate. Benefitting from a rally-around-the-flag effect, Chow’s spending plan got passed with minimal drama.

Also, City Hall Watcher welcomed another guest writer, as Madeleine Bonsma-Fisher looked at City Hall’s Complete Streets strategies, and what the data tells us about their impact on safety.

March

Lobbyist Watch continued to report on various robot-related lobbying files. There’d be a lot of those in 2025. Meanwhile, I helped set the stage for City Hall’s response to U.S. tariffs by looking at where departments tend to spend their money. They buy a lot from Amazon, it turns out. I also took a look at new data on bike theft and previewed and recapped a Council meeting in which councillors asked for more Canadian flags — and gave themselves a big pay raise.

April

Lobbyist Watch looked at a flurry of lobbying activity that followed the winter snowstorms. Council expense records for 2024 dropped, which gave me another opportunity to chart how councillors get around the city. It’s always a revealing chart. Council prepared for a debate on making Toronto more aesthetically appealing, and finally got around to creating a car czar.

May

After some finance guy became the Prime Minister, former councillor Jennifer McKelvie got a new job too. Lobbyist Watch featured some bah humbugging about the Distillery Christmas Market. Guest writer Damien Moule looked at the data on multiplex construction in Toronto. They’re multiplying, but perhaps not fast enough. A report on the City’s capital assets gave councillors some capital-C concerns. And Council got trapped in a bubbly debate about bubble zones.

June

The debate over whether to install transit lanes on Bathurst Street was bolstered by a bunch of lobbying — and some AI. Meanwhile, I charted some of the TTC’s troubling trends and updated the Council Scorecard with a look at which councillors might be voting in ways contrary to their constituents. I also spent a lot of time previewing the contentious Council debate on sixplexes. In the end, as they often do, Council embraced compromise.

July

Lobbyists for Magna’s robot car pilot continued to dominate the lobbyist charts. I got ready for Council’s debate on the Bathurst Street bus lanes with a special edition of Intersection Inspection. Council’s July meeting also featured a fractious debate on six new shelter sites. In the end, Council compromised on the Bathurst bus lane plan but held firm on the shelters.

August

The annual Council Power Rankings brought the usual share of controversy to my inbox, plus one of my favourite charts of the year — a look at which councillors are moving the most motions, and how many of those motions are successful.

Also in the month: Lobbyist Watch chronicled more robots. I looked at the five councillors forming Mayor Olivia Chow’s main opposition. And it looked like we’d be getting a battle between Chow and new PM Mark Carney over shelter space. Thankfully, cooler heads prevailed.

September

Lobbyist Watch featured a visit from our old pal (?) John Baird. The provincial government’s move to ban speed cameras prompted me to speed through some analysis of the Parkside Drive speed camera, where many tickets were issued — and traffic was slowed — before some people took a literal axe to it. I also looked at the growing number of Toronto intersections where pedestrians and cyclists outnumber cars. And the future arrived with the new Council Scorecard. The month ended with some data showing how the condo crash was taking a big bite out of expected City revenue through development charges.

October

The gondola lobbyists pulled up in Lobbyist Watch. Council returned from their summer break to make an attempt to save the speed camera program from Premier Doug Ford. Spoiler: it didn’t work. I looked at the Toronto Parking Authority’s emptiest parking lots and attempted to build a better dashboard for tracking Toronto’s progress building new housing.

November

The Blue Jays almost did the thing, but, alas, it wasn’t to be. I soothed my sadness by covering some lobbying activity. Council, meanwhile, found yet another way to compromise — this time on neighbourhood retail. They also — surprise! — disbanded the Toronto Parking Authority Board. I tried to figure out why, and concluded it’s probably mostly a money thing. Meanwhile, each councillor got a housing report card, and we all had a good laugh about the sheer size of the new speed limit signs provided by Queen’s Park.

December

Waymo drove into the lobbyist registry, prompting some hype and handwringing about self-driving cars. I introduced a new feature to the Council Scorecard: the Council buddy system. And I previewed and recapped the final Council meeting of 2025, featuring a festive debate about a faster Finch LRT. The meeting delivered a seasonal mix of exciting gifts and lumps of coal.

Charted: Council’s longest 2025 debates

In 2025, for the first time ever, I produced a chart after every Council meeting with approximate debate lengths. So I figured, hey, why not combine them into one mega-chart? Everyone loves mega-charts.

Across 100 debates I tracked, the longest debate of the year was, of course, the 2025 budget debate. The second spot goes to the May 2025 debate on whether Toronto should have a “bubble zone” bylaw restricting protests. Taking the noble bronze? The October 2025 discussion on speed cameras.

You can view the complete list here.

More from Matt: on feeling optimistic about Toronto’s future, despite the doom and gloom

📰 For the Toronto Star over the holidays, I tried to push back against some of the algorithmically-generated doomerism I’ve been seeing about Toronto these days.

Yes, the city still has big problems to figure out, but the data is showing positive trends on crime, homelessness, and rent prices. There’s hope in the numbers. Believe in them.

The week at Toronto City Hall

No meetings scheduled.

City Hall Watcher #364

📊 Council Scorecard access code: LONGDECEMBER  

Thanks for reading — both today and all year long. After a break to recharge the batteries and count backwards from ten, I’ll be back at full power next Monday, with LOBBYIST WATCH, including a chart of 2025’s top lobbyists.

In this issue, I’ve got a recap of the final Toronto City Council meeting of 2025, with notes on debates about making a faster Finch, a new land transfer tax rate increase targeting those who may live a life of luxury, a TTC money-back g…

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In this issue, I’ve got your full preview of the December 2025 meeting of Toronto City Council. They’re set to debate ways to speed up the very unspeedy Finch West LRT, a new tax on luxurious homes, not-quite-luxuri…

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Anyway, enough of this gooey show of emotion. We’ve got a newsletter to do. This week, I’ve got the first major update to my n…

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This week, I’m sad to report it’s already December. But the good news is that means a new edition of LOBBYIST WATCH. I’ve got notes on Waymo’s potential Toronto entry, some shattered glass falling on toddlers, garbage bins with wifi, a controversial north Toronto MZO, and mo…

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What happened this week

🪧 COULD BE A BAD SIGN: A fun piece from the Star’s Mahdis Habibinia reveals that the speed-limit signs Premier Doug Ford has supplied to Toronto and other municipalities as a replacement for speed cameras are… big.

Really big.

I feel like maybe you’ll read those words and imagine a sign that is only somewhat larger than a typical sign, but that’s wrong. Here’s a helpful visual aid provided by Councillor Tim Tierney of Ottawa, using his own body — the body of an adult human — for scale.

The City received 80 of these signs this week — with instructions to install them in 20 of the locations previously covered by speed cameras — but the colossal nature of the signs caught City Hall off guard. Mayor Olivia Chow pointed out that the City would need to get new poles to support the weight of the signs. There are also concerns that these massive signs may cause sightline issues for drivers and pedestrians.

And, of course, there’s a lot of doubt that these signs — even so supersized — will do much to slow down traffic.

Meanwhile, reports this morning confirm that a pedestrian was hit and seriously injured by a driver yesterday on Parkside Drive. Parkside was previously home to a speed camera that, when it wasn’t vandalized or thrown into duck ponds, issued a heck of a lot of tickets.

🚇💲 TTC BUDGET TRICKS: For Toronto Today, Aidan Chamandy takes on the riddle of how the TTC managed to fill a $232-million hole in their proposed 2026 operating budget without a fare increase or service cuts. The budget was discussed this week at a meeting of the TTC’s Strategic Planning Committee.

It’s a tale of accounting adjustments and reserve funds, though it seems important to ask how much this might cost in future budgets.

⛴️ SHIP SHAPE: A motion from Deputy Mayor Ausma Malik at this week’s meeting of Toronto & East York Community Council confirms rumours that Waterfront Toronto will be testing out a new water shuttle serving various destinations along the waterfront next summer.

Service will begin in June, and stops will include Portland Slip, the water taxi docks on the central waterfront and the new Biidaasige Park in the port lands. Malik’s motion asks for a traffic study assessing the impacts of the Portland Slip stop.

Monday, December 1

🎶 The Music Advisory Committee meets at City Hall at 9:30 a.m. 

ZONING JAM SESSION: The committee will listen to the melodic tones of a bunch of bureaucratic presentations, including an update on the ongoing work to clarify zoning and licensing categories for music venues.

🚇 The TTC’s Audit & Risk Management Committee meets at TTC HQ at 10 a.m.

NO FARE FOR FINCH: The good news is that the Finch West LRT is opening on December 7. The bad news is that the TTC already seems to be worried that no one riding it will pay the fare.

A proposed audit plan for the TTC in 2026 lists fare evasion on Line 6, the new Finch West LRT, as a “top risk” for financial sustainability, and lays out a plan to evaluate fare evasion on the line, even though the line hasn’t collected its first fare. The report notes that Line 5, the Eglinton Crosstown, may be added to the audit if it ever actually opens, which we all pray it will.

The concern is likely rooted in how fare collection will work on these lines. Unlike with streetcar routes, riders on Finch and Eglinton will have to pay their fares via Presto readers installed at the stops. There will be no way to pay your fare once on board. At the very least, I expect this will cause a lot of confusion.

🦁 The Zoo Board meets at the Zoo at 2 p.m.

MENDING FENCES: The Board will be asked to approve a $1.6 million contract to improve the fencing around the zoo, which should help the zoo avoid a situation like the Great Capybara Escape that bedevilled the High Park Zoo in 2016.

AND ALSO:

• Attendance remains a problem. Compared to 2024, visitor numbers are down 7%. The summer heat made for lousy zoo weather, apparently.

• The zoo has a plan for using Artificial Intelligence. The board will get a presentation.

💳 The Debenture Committee meets at City Hall at 4 p.m.

DEBT DEALING: The committee will approve $200 million in new debt. The City got a 4.7% interest rate for the loan, which will cover a mix of TTC and TCHC projects.

📚 The Library Board meets at the Reference Library at 6 p.m.

FROM WE TO ABC: As first reported in City Hall Watcher in October, a report on the agenda confirms the new location of the St. Lawrence Branch will be the former WE Charity HQ building at Queen East & Parliament. The sale of the property was finalized on November 21 for a cool $26 million.

The new district-scale library branch will take over three floors of the building, while the Library’s IT department will be relegated to the basement. The current St. Lawrence branch is 4,833 square feet, while the new library space will be 30,000 square feet. A nice upgrade. Another report on the agenda confirms that the relocated branch is also set to become home to a Youth Hub as early as 2028.

BUDGET BOOKS: After a request from the City to trim its spending, the library has revised its 2026 budget submission.

Instead of the 10.3% operating budget increase they first asked for, they are now requesting an increase of 7.8%. It works out to a reduction of about $6.4 million.

Part of the reduction comes from a freeze on the budget for purchasing new library materials. The library doesn’t seem happy about this change:

This will have a service impact by reducing access to TPL’s circulating collections in 2026 and increasing wait times. This negatively impacts the library’s most core service, providing universal access to knowledge, ideas and opinions that represent and amplify the voices of the communities it serves.

The board will also be asked to approve a trim of about $27 million from the library’s capital plan, a change motivated by a dramatic decline in development charge revenue. The reduction means that plans to make repairs and accessibility improvements at the Reference Library have been pushed to future years.

AND ALSO:

• City Librarian Moe Hosseini-Ara tells us that approximately 21,000 people took advantage of the first day of expanded Sunday hours at all 100 branches on October 19.

Tuesday, December 2

📉 The Economic & Community Development Committee meets at City Hall at 9:30 a.m.

PARK PROFANITY: A set of updates to the City’s park bylaw offer good news for sailors, or at least those of us who like to swear like them.

The proposal strikes out the part of a longstanding section of the bylaw that prohibits “profane” language in parks. It also removes part of the bylaw that banned people from indulging in “boisterous conduct.”

The old section read like this:

A. While in a park, no person shall: (1) Indulge in riotous, boisterous, violent, threatening, or illegal conduct or use profane or abusive language;

The new section reads like this:

A. While in a park, no person shall: (1) Engage in any form of harassment or riotous, violent, threatening, or illegal conduct; or use abusive language;

It’s good news for those of you who love being boisterous too.

The updates also remove a specific provision banning park-goers from flying hot air balloons. The city says hot air balloons are “outdated technology.” We’ll see about that.

ABSENT AMERICANS: Via new data from Destination Toronto, the committee will learn that tense cross-border relations have contributed to a significant decline in the number of Americans coming to the city.

“U.S. visitation remains 6% behind 2024, with nearly 80,000 fewer American visitors travelling to Toronto as of the end of September,” the report says.

But hey, the difference has been somewhat offset by increased visits from the other two countries that traditionally send a lot of tourists our way. Visits from Germany are up 7% while visits from the UK are up a massive 12%. Blimey.

AND ALSO:

• With youth unemployment sitting at 15.2%, staff are proposing a plan to hire at least 1,000 more young people next summer. The big FIFA spectacle should also create some more youth job opportunities, the report says.

• The City is asking for approval to lease some space at 355 Church Street to house a new training facility for Community Crisis Service workers.

• A separate report offers some justification for training more crisis workers, concluding that crisis workers on the TTC could have responded to more than 10,000 calls this year, freeing up police officers and special constables to deal with other safety matters. Council recently approved a pilot putting crisis workers on the downtown part of Line 1.

• A report on Toronto’s reconciliation plan says “the City has more work to do.” Of 141 sub-actions in the plan, 103 are in progress, and three have been completed.

⚽️ The FIFA World Cup 2026 Subcommittee meets at City Hall at 9:30 a.m.

MLSE’S MONEY: The contract for “temporary hospitality structures” for the FIFA event has increased by $2 million. But the increase will be fully funded by MLSE, so there’s no impact on the City’s overall $380 million budget for the FIFA event.

Previously, in City Hall Watcher

For paid subscribers of City Hall Watcher, this week’s issue has:

• It’s a chart-filled issue looking at housing starts by ward. Some councillors have seen a ton of development since Council adopted its HousingTO targets. Others have seen hardly any. It turns out some who complain a lot about the impacts of development live in wards that don’t see much of it.

• Speaking of development, Premier Doug Ford says development charges never increased when he was a councillor at City Hall. Is that true? I’ve got a classic Ford Fact Check.

Next week:

• LOBBYIST WATCH returns with a look at what City Hall lobbyists were doing in November.

Subscribe today for ad-free access to weekly subscriber-exclusive issues. Subscribers also get access to the COUNCIL SCORECARD — an interactive history of councillor voting records on major items, dating all the way back to 2010.

Subscribe now

Wednesday, December 3

🏘️ The Planning & Housing Committee meets at City Hall at 9:30 a.m.

AMAZING AVENUES: The planning department has completed its study of the various avenues in Councillor Alejandra Bravo’s Ward 9 and Councillor Dianne Saxe’s Ward 11. They’re recommending rezoning and official plan amendments for nearly 2,000 land parcels across both wards. The changes, largely concentrated on Dufferin, Oakwood, Ossington, and Christie, will generally allow for as-of-right permission for buildings up to six storeys.

Rosedale is spared from major rezoning because of a heritage conservation plan in the neighbourhood. Planners are also shying away from recommending rezoning for land located near designated employment areas.

This process has not exactly been speedy, and it doesn’t look like that’ll change. The planning department is now recommending an additional process, with consultations, to develop a “Residential Apartment Avenue Zone” that will apply to these areas.

Avenue studies for other wards are scheduled for the next few years, starting with the remaining wards in the Old Toronto & East York area.

THE WINDS OF THE LABOUR MARKET: The results of Toronto’s 2025 employment survey are out. The good news is that the city continues to see job growth, adding 23,410 jobs this year to take the total to 1.62 million — a record high. The bad news is that growth is slowing. The 1.5% increase in jobs this year is significantly lower than the 4.2% increase the city saw last year, and below the 2.3% average annual growth over the last five years.

Office jobs made up the largest share of the growth. Jobs in retail, manufacturing & warehousing and the institutional sector all saw year-over-year declines.

AND ALSO:

• Willowdale rep Councillor Lily Cheng is marshalling residents via email and social media to weigh in on a new secondary plan for North York Centre that outlines development that could grow North York Centre’s population from about 64,000 today to 170,000 over the next 30 years.

• An update on Toronto’s new citywide rooming house regulations offers a few interesting numbers. After rooming houses became legal citywide in March 2024, the city has licensed 180 of what they now call “multi-tenant homes.” A whole lot of rooming houses — the City suspects about 2,118 — are still operating without a license. Councillor Parthi Kandavel’s Ward 20 has the most suspected unlicensed rooming houses, with 296. A program to provide landlords with financial support for renovating existing rooming houses to bring them into compliance with the new regulations has had some interest, but no one has taken the City up on the offer yet. The report asks Council to increase the eligibility threshold from $50,000 per room to $100,000 to try to get some takers.

• After residents in midtown expressed concern about so-called “iceberg homes” — houses built by the wealthy with sprawling subterranean lairs with room for things like classic car collections — staff are recommending a rule that basements can’t extend further than the upper levels of a house.

🤝 The Corporations Nominating Panel meets at City Hall at 9:30 a.m.

BROAD BOARDS: The panel chaired by Councillor Paula Fletcher will consider names for gigs on the Convention Centre Board and the CreateTO Board.

Thursday, December 4

🚧 The Infrastructure & Environment Committee meets at City Hall at 9:30 a.m.

CYCLING IS KINGSTON: A plan to install a new batch of bike lanes is on the agenda. To avoid any conflict with recent legislation passed by Premier Doug Ford’s government restricting the City’s powers to redesign roads, the package generally sticks to plans that maintain car lanes or put the bike lanes on the boulevard alongside roads.

These additions total about 20.5 kilometres. Kingston Road is the headline, as staff are suggesting a six-kilometre bikeway between Cliffside Drive and Scarborough Golf Club Road. All six car lanes are proposed to be retained.

There’s good rationale for improvements along Kingston. The report says there were 1,910 collisions in the area between 2014 and 2024, with 22 serious injuries and six deaths.

➡️ For more on the cycling plan and other routes that are now likely imperilled by provincial legislation — including the link between the new bike lanes on Kingston and the Danforth complete street — cycling advocate Robert Zaichkowski has you covered.

NOT EASY BEING GREEN: An update on the City’s TransformTO plan doesn’t offer much good news for fans of the environment.

A new forecast shows the City is on track to miss its 2040 Net Zero target. There’s a large gap of about 7.8 megatonnes of “residual emissions”, and the gap is likely to grow, the report says, as the provincial and federal governments continue to back away from programs like the carbon tax, the EV mandate and the Green Standard for buildings.

Speaking of governments that are backing away from environmental initiatives, the report also recommends the City Hall hold off on plans to establish a Building Emissions Performance Standards program. The program would have set limits on how much energy and emissions a building can produce. Staff say it isn’t ready for prime time due to tariff uncertainty, the ongoing wind-down of provincial and federal environmental programs, and affordability concerns in today’s economy. Environmental advocates plan to show up to the meeting to argue otherwise.

• A report recommends the City try out a few new types of parking signage. A pilot will see digital “Towing in Effect” no-parking signage installed along select streetcar routes. They’ll be lit up during major snowstorms. At the request of Mayor Olivia Chow, the city will also test two new types of signs letting people know the rules for on-street parking — one that uses plain language and one that’s more visual. The pilot will start next spring and run for 18 months.

• City Hall Chief Communications Officer Julia Oosterman will attend the meeting to detail plans to communicate the looming change to blue box collection that’ll kick in on January 1, when the City is set to exit residential recycling collection and let private consortium Circular Materials deal with the various cans and bottles and such. Councillors are very worried that it’s going to be a rocky handoff. A separate report details Circular Material’s plans to change the day some residents get their bins picked up.

• A report on sidewalk snow clearing examines an idea brought forward by Councillor Dianne Saxe that would require corporate landlords to shovel their sidewalks, instead of just waiting for a City sidewalk plow to roll by. Staff reject the idea, arguing that it’s hard to define what a “corporate landlord” is.

• Magna’s self-driving car pilot on the west side of downtown ended unceremoniously in October. The company hasn’t offered much explanation for what happened, but a letter on this agenda offers a clue. Ashley Curtis, the City’s Acting GM of Transportation, says the Magna cars showed some really bad behaviours. “These behaviours included vehicles incapable of making right turns at red lights, incapable of appropriately participating in turn-taking at stop-sign controlled intersections, frequent abrupt stops in response to a variety of common stimuli, veering out of lane of travel, turn signals that didn’t function, and an unscheduled shut-down and re-boot in a lane of live traffic with inability to move to the side of the road,” writes Curtis. There were also serious privacy concerns with the vehicle’s cameras. The City would like Queen’s Park to impose more stringent rules and regulations before authorizing any other self-driving car tests.

• Councillor Frances Nunziata has brought forward plans to create a “Weston Loop” of public parks in her ward over the next 25 years. It comes with some snazzy art:

Friday, December 5

🎢 The Exhibition Place Board meets at the Automotive Building at 9:30 a.m.

RISING RENT: The Board will be asked to sign off on a proposal to raise event rental rates for the Enercare Centre, Better Living Centre and Queen Elizabeth Hall by 3% each year between 2031 and 2035. For the Automotive Building, the rate is proposed to increase at a slower rate — with a 3% increase scheduled for every other year over the same period.

🌳 North York Community Council meets at North York Civic Centre at 9:30 a.m.

BIG APPROVALS, BIG REJECTIONS: There are several big development proposals on the agenda.

Planners are recommending that the Community Council approve:

✅ A two-tower development with 1,115 units and a new YMCA on Sheppard East.

✅ A four-tower project with 2,377 units and a new community centre on Sheppard East.

But they are recommending refusal for these ones:

❌ A 49-storey tower on Avondale Avenue with 504 units.

❌ A two-tower project with 1,238 units on Sheppard East.

❌ A 25-storey building with 256 units on Eglinton Avenue East.

The Week After Next

• The General Government Committee meets on Monday, December 8.

• Mayor Olivia Chow’s Executive Committee meets on Tuesday, December 9.

• The TTC Board meets on Wednesday, December 10.

• The reconstituted Toronto Parking Authority Board meets for the first time on Friday, December 12.

The Far-Flung Future

• Council meets for the final time in 2025, starting on Tuesday, December 16.

• The City’s budget launch is set for Thursday, January 8, 2026.

Feedback? Tip? Email Matt Elliott at graphicmatt@gmail.com. For advertising inquiries, email Sean Hansel at seanishansel@gmail.com.

I’ve also got an impromptu Ford Fact Check, and a look a…

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