Blue bins get sold, more parks get beer, and the vacant home tax gets fixed — maybe
The Week at Toronto City Hall for April 22 to 26, 2024, featuring a mini recap of an April Council meeting, plus some new housing projects and tiny cars go to the Ex.
Hey there! Council’s April 2024 meeting is in the books. It was a relatively efficient two-day session that only got weird at the end, when a late-evening debate about an Annex development devolved into procedural chaos. But more on that later! In this issue, I’ve got a quick recap of the big decisions from the Council meeting, plus a look at next week’s City Hall calendar, featuring some big new CreateTO housing projects and some very tiny cars. — Matt Elliott
What happened this week
Toronto City Council met this week.
➡️ My full thread of coverage is available on Mastodon. No sign-in necessary.
The highlights:
🫥 The vacant home tax lives. Council voted against a motion from Councillor Vince Crisanti to cancel the program. Instead, Mayor Olivia Chow and colleagues opted to task staff with a total revamp in time for next year’s budget. The redesign will include a look at using utility data to help determine whether a home is empty.
🅿️ Council voted to raise the fines related to parking offences. Councillor Jennifer McKelvie brokered a compromise motion that separated parking offences into two categories: safety-related offences like parking in a bike lane and “nuisance” offences that are mostly annoying, like not paying at a meter.
The safety-related category of offences was increased in line with staff recommendations, while nuisance offences saw lesser increases designed to be closer to the inflation rate.
♻️ Council confirmed the sale of its stock of 517,513 residential blue bins. They’ll become the property of the winner of an RFP to become Toronto’s new collector of recycling materials starting in 2026. The City opted not to bid to continue collection under the province’s new Extended Producer Responsibility program, pointing to some onerous terms that would be imposed on workers. The price of the blue bins isn’t yet public information.
🍻 After a successful pilot where alcohol was allowed in 27 parks, Council voted to continue to allow drinking in those parks and also some more parks. They’ll be taking an incremental approach that will see more parks added to the list where alcohol is permitted over time. As part of the framework, each ward will need to have at least one park where it’s legal to crack a beer.
Attempts by councillors James Pasternak, Stephen Holyday, Anthony Perruzza and Frances Nunziata to opt out entirely of having alcohol-permitting parks in their wards were quickly downed in a series of close votes.
I’ll have a more in-depth look at some of these decisions and others on Monday.
Monday, April 22
🏗️ The CreateTO Board meets via videoconference at 2:30 p.m.The Board responsible for the City’s real estate holdings will get an update on 18 housing projects, representing 10,380 units. Of those, 7,747 are planned as rental units, and 3,569 of those are planned as affordable rental units.
Progress is still slow. Only three projects on the list—50 Wilson Heights, 140 Merton, and Bloor/Kipling Block 1—have construction start dates. The rest remain TBD.
Villiers Island in the port lands debuts on the tracker this month. The report says the number of units to be built in the new waterfront neighbourhood will be decided in a report to the June 13 meeting of the Planning & Housing Committee. There’s a lot of room here to build a lot of housing.
Other new additions:
1113-1117 Dundas Street West, a Green P parking lot that’ll be built out of wood as part of the Mass Timber Pilot Project.
931 Yonge Street, the current TCHC head office.
610 Bay Street / 130 Elizabeth Street, the old Toronto Coach Terminal site.
72 Amroth Avenue, the midrise development brought forward as part of Councillor Brad Bradford’s Expanding Housing Options in Neighbourhoods pilot in Beaches-East York.
Tuesday, April 23
Passover. No meetings are scheduled.
Previously, in City Hall Watcher
For paid subscribers of City Hall Watcher, this week’s issue has:
We lean on AI to help with some analysis of the percentage of contracts awarded by the Bid Award Panel that had just one bid. There’s a trend, and it’s not great.
ChatGPT also lends a robotic hand in looking at where Toronto ranks in terms of provincial economic development funds handed out by Premier Doug Ford’s government.
A first look at City Hall’s new data on dangerous dogs. Where are the dangerous dogs located? And should we fear Mushroom Boo Boo?
Next week:
A detailed look at the major decisions made at the April Council meeting, what they mean, and what comes next.
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Wednesday, April 24
🏚️ The Preservation Board meets via videoconference at 9:30 a.m.The Board handling heritage matters will have a very special meeting to orient some new board members about meeting procedures. They’ll also get a presentation on the requirements of the Ontario Heritage Act.
🎭 The Board of Directors of TO Live meets at City Hall at 12:30 p.m.The Board responsible for the City’s theatres will receive four new Council-approved board members: Brian Astl, Robyn Citizen, Wasifa Noshin and Sun Young Yoon.
The Board will also consider a new collective agreement with IATSE Local 58. The production support union has been working without a contract at the Meridian Arts Centre since their last deal expired at the end of 2020, so this is a long time coming.
🏆 The Bid Award Panel meets via videoconference at 2 p.m.CONTRACT AWARD OF THE WEEK: up to $30.5 million for office furniture.
Thursday, April 25
🎢 The Board of Governors of Exhibition Place meets at Beanfield Centre at 9:30 a.m.
TINY CARS HIT THE EX: The Exhibition Place board will hear about a coming project that will see four tiny SARIT cars tested and used on the Ex property over the next year.
SARIT vehicles are pint-sized three-wheeled electric cars with a range of about 100 kilometres. The company was created by auto parts magnate Frank Stronach. The Exhibition Place project emerged from a deal Stronach made with York University to test the vehicles.
It’s unclear from the report what the cute little cars will be used for. It could be fun to see how many clowns could fit inside one of them.
WONDER WALL: The Board will consider a contract award worth about $2.7 million to a vendor who will install a new “Indigenous Feature Wall” at Centennial Square. The design was created by Indigenous artists selected by Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation. In addition to looking pretty darn cool, it’s also designed as a noise barrier to quiet traffic on the Gardiner.
AND ALSO:
Bye-bye, Beanfield Centre. Beanfield Technologies, going through “significant restructuring and ownership changes,” has told the Ex that they’re exercising their right to give one-year notice and terminate the deal they signed with the Ex for naming rights in March 2017. In response, the board is being asked to sole-source a contract with Wakeham and Associates Marketing to find a new naming rights partner—and a new name for the building.
In response to City Hall’s recently approved Nightlife Action Plan, the Board will be asked to designate all events set to be held at Exhibition Place between May and September as “Municipally Significant.” This will allow restaurants serving events like the Honda Indy, the Collision Conference, TIFF, and Pride Toronto to apply for extended alcohol-serving hours.
Sharon Bollenbach, the Executive Director of Toronto’s World Cup Secretariat, will attend the meeting to offer an update on hosting the soccer mega-event in 2026.
🐕 The Dangerous Dog Review Tribunal meets via videoconference at 9:30 a.m.The Board will review the case of Portuguese Water Dog / Poodle Kaibo. The case has already been delayed twice. It was originally on the agenda last October.
Friday, April 26
💨 The Board of Directors of the Toronto Atmospheric Fund meets at City Hall at 9:30 a.m.The Board will consider awarding $353,643 in grants to organizations trying to fight and mitigate climate change.
Funded projects include a study of how Thermal Energy Networks can help neighbourhoods, a project that will create a coalition to help the federal government shape policies on zero-emission trucks, and the development of a Green Development Standard for the Hamilton-Burlington Bay area.
The Week After Next
The Economic & Community Development Committee and the Police Board meet on Tuesday, April 30.
It’s going to be May. The General Government Committee meets on Wednesday, May 1.
The Infrastructure & Environment Committee meets on Thursday, May 2.
The Far-Flung Future
Mayor Olivia Chow’s Executive Committee meets next on May 14
Council’s next meeting starts on Wednesday, May 22.
Feedback? Tip? Email Matt Elliott. For advertising inquiries, email Sean Hansel.