Anthony Furey: Can Toronto rid itself of Mayor Olivia Chow?

For political observers, the Toronto mayoral election has been going on for months. But for the general public, the race gets underway this week.

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Voters will cast their ballots in a little over six weeks, deciding whether to give incumbent Mayor Olivia Chow another term or opt for one of the main challengers: Councillor Brad Bradford or former federal minister Chris Alexander, a last-minute addition to the race.

Before they can make that decision, however, they will need to consider both Chow’s record and what she is promising for a second term as mayor.

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One reason the race is only firing up now is that the period from May (when registrations opened) to October is a long campaign. People tune out during the summer. It’s natural to consider the stretch after Labour Day the real campaign, with the earlier months serving as a warm-up act.

The other reason, though, is that the incumbent has declined to campaign until now. While Chow registered for re-election at the end of May to make her intentions known, she’s so far done little to no campaigning.

She only launched her campaign Wednesday night. Before then, there were no policy announcements or campaign events. And her campaign website offers no substance.

This contrasts with Bradford, who has been vigorously campaigning since registering in May. Opinion polls have consistently shown Chow in the lead with Bradford in a close second. But what will they show now that she’s ramping things up?

Once she starts campaigning, everything changes. The question is how. Chow’s lead could significantly widen. Or, if she fails to meet the moment and doesn’t read the electorate’s pulse, she could fall behind.

The other month, I watched Chow deliver a speech to Scarborough Business Association members that was clearly designed to test out campaign themes.

The mayor focused on reducing 911 response times and keeping taxes low. These aren’t themes you’d expect from a longstanding NDP politician, especially one who has spent the past three years raising property taxes significantly higher than inflation.

Chow has since confirmed that lower tax increases will be her goal for a second term, arguing that the first round of larger increases was necessary to fix the budget and that lower rates can now be enjoyed.

This is the municipal version of how provincial and federal leaders always manage to drum up a balanced budget right when re-election time comes around. Let’s see if the voters buy it.

Chow is no political novice. She was first elected to public office over 40 years ago as a school board trustee. Long before her late husband Jack Layton was federal NDP leader, he ran for mayor of Toronto in 1991, and Chow won a council seat that year.

Chow’s mayoralty didn’t come out of nowhere. It’s been decades in the making and the prize is not something she and her team will give up easily.

Her campaign slogan, unveiled Wednesday, is a “caring, affordable, and safe city.” The re-election strategy may not be complicated. It could just be to pivot to the centre, say little and lean into the incumbent advantage.

After all, Bradford’s aggressive campaign to unseat Chow goes against what has become a local political truism in Toronto — that an incumbent mayor can’t be beat.

Chow was elected just over three years ago in a by-election triggered by John Tory’s sudden resignation. That campaign lasted three months and about 10 major candidates sought the leadership of the country’s largest city.

One reason so many candidates put forward serious campaigns was that, without an incumbent, the race was anyone’s to win.

Recent Toronto political history shows that, since megacity amalgamation in the 1990s, few serious candidates have stepped forward to challenge an incumbent mayor.

When Tory ran for re-election in 2018, the only serious challenger came in second with 24 per cent of the vote. Then when he ran for his third term in 2022, he was virtually unopposed. This pattern wasn’t unique to Tory; similar scenarios played out during the re-elections of the right-leaning Mel Lastman and the left-leaning David Miller.

From now until the election, I look forward to offering regular dispatches examining the campaign’s issues, personalities and themes.

My first regular gig with the National Post was covering the iconic 2010 election won by Rob Ford and then I experienced the 2023 mayoral election as one of the leading candidates, so this is familiar terrain.

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Anthony Furey is a former journalist and past Toronto mayoral candidate who now works in corporate consulting. 

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