COUNTERWEIGHTS EDITORS, GANATSEKWYAGON, ON. SATURDAY, JUNE 17, 2023. This past Thursday night we watched a cp24 debate among what cp24 regards as the “seven top candidates vying to lead Toronto” in the unusual mayoral byelection this coming Monday, June 26 — only nine days hence. The seven leaders are, in alphabetical order by surname : Ana Bailao, Brad Bradford, Olivia Chow, Anthony Furey, Mitzie Hunter, Josh Matlow, and Mark Saunders.

Virtually all opinion polls place Olivia Chow (widow of former federal NDP leader Jack Layton, among many other things) in a comfortable lead. Eg : Mainstreet Research June 9–11, released June 14, had Chow 32.6%, Bailao 17%, Saunders 14.2%, Furey 8.7%, Hunter 8.3% , etc.

A still more recent poll from Mainstreet has revealed that : “As of Friday [June 16] , if the election were held today, 31 per cent of decided voters would vote for Chow … with Bailao at 14 per cent, Mark Saunders at 13 per cent, Josh Matlow at 12 per cent and Anthony Furey at 11 per cent. Mitzie Hunter, Chloe Brown and Brad Bradford have each held onto 6 per cent, 5 per cent and 4 per cent, respectively”

These numbers all apply to decided voters, and Mainstreet is reporting a still high 18% undecided. So in one sense anything might still happen nine days from today!

The inevitability of Olivia Chow?

At the same time, all Olivia Chow has to do to win is take just a plurality of votes, ahead of everyone else. Under Ontario municipal law she doesn’t need anything like 50%. And she has been the leading candidate in virtually all the polls taken so far. (We at least can’t think of an exception.)

At our Friday morning meeting on Thursday night’s debate it was suggested Ms. Chow’s great advantage is that she is just the best known of all the candidates.

We heard one story about a retired high-school teacher who taught in Toronto for decades (though he now lives in the so-called City of Kawartha Lakes), but only recognized the name of one of the several leading candidates in the June 26 mayoral by-election — Olivia Chow!

Everyone at our meeting in the office boardroom Friday morning lives in Toronto today, and is entitled to vote in the June 26 mayoral by-election. Virtually all of us are still calling ourselves officially undecided, but there was substantial support expressed for Ana Bailao, Olivia Chow, and Mitzie Hunter. (All women — just like the recent two-woman race for Premier of Alberta!)

102 registered candidates in 2023 — highest number ever registered for mayor of T.O.

Several at our boardroom meeting (in front of the giant TV, on the wall beside the window) also urged that the in some ways most fascinating aspect of this unusual mayoral by-election in Canada’s current most populous city is the total number of registered candidates.

Toronto often enough has far more candidates running for mayor than the handful of main contenders recognized by the mass media (and most of the voters). But the unusual by-election of 2023 — occasioned by former Mayor John Tory’s somewhat surprising resignation over a just-revealed (though ended) extramarital affair — has apparently set a record.

As reported by Mark McAllister and John Marchesan at City News : “A total of 102 candidates have registered to run for mayor in the byelection set for June 26, including a dog named Molly … It’s the highest number of candidates ever registered to run for mayor, surpassing the previous high of 65 in the 2014 municipal election. In 2022, there were 31 candidates seeking the mayor’s job.”

A CBC News site report nicely clarifies that each of these 102 individuals (and in Molly the dog’s case it’s her human companion Toby Heaps, an environmentalist who has been endorsed by no less than Ralph Nader) “must:* File a nomination paper with original signature. * Provide proof of qualifying address within Toronto. * Pay a $200 nomination filing fee. * Provide at least 25 endorsements of nomination from eligible Toronto voters with original signatures.”

An even dozen haphazard cases beyond the the “7 leading candidates” in cp24 debate

In any event our Friday morning meeting (almost) concluded with some vague collective look at the official City of Toronto list of all 102 candidates in alphabetical order by surname. For most of the candidates the list includes at least one (and usually more) of email, phone number, website, and twitter or facebook page. (On a very hasty survey we counted only 18 of the 102 candidates with just their names and date of registration as a candidate on the official list.)

Here are very short notes on an even dozen of the 102 candidates — beyond the seven front-runners who figured in this past Thursday’s cp24 TV debate :

(1) Darren Atkinson : Who has a “Campaign song ‘Change Your World’ written by Darren Atkinson and performed by Atkinson Audio, and a “9 FOR THE 6IX PLATFORM” — the last of which is “9. Revive Live Music in Toronto and make this city a music capital as Nashville is to the United States.”

(2) Jamie Atkinson : “Help address the Climate Emergency while getting more time back through Electrification! … Meet the new Toronto, like a fine glass of wine. … We can build homes quicker, manage traffic better, and make public transportation a breeze … By voting for me, you’re voting person who is committed to fighting climate change and moving forward with our more prosperous digital future.”

(3) Gru Jesse Allan : “Gru was homeless for eight and a half years, until he was recently rehoused in a rent-geared-to-income apartment. He is a cyclist and community advocate, who worked as a courier for the majority of the time that he was unhoused … He is motivated by the core belief that those of us who have built this city, who make this city what it is, deserve a dignified life, and a Toronto that cares for its citizens.”

(4) Chloe Brown : “running for Toronto Mayor because she believes that good policy is informed by the people who work on the frontlines of city life.”

(5) Roland Chan : “Engineering a better Toronto. I am grateful to be able to give back to the city that gave so much to me. I want to make a better and safer Toronto for my family and yours.”

(6) Rob Davis : “Born and Raised in Toronto. Committed to Serving all Residents … Rob Davis is, and has been, a fixture in municipal, provincial, and federal politics for three decades … has served as City Councillor, School Trustee, Transit Commissioner, provincial candidate, and campaign manager for the Conservative Party of Canada and PC Party of Ontario.”

(7) Gong Xiaohua : “Your property taxes stop here … Free TTC rides for those aged 55 and above & 18 and below … Provide a $6/school day lunch subsidy for students … 1000 New Police Officers for schools and the TTC … Accelerate the construction of affordable and senior housing … Cut 1000 dollars per household on property taxes … Build a Web3 industry and make the world’s metaverse centre.” (Oh and see as well : “China pyramid-scheme probe: Xiao Hua Gong charged in Canada, NZ police freeze nearly $70m,” 24 Jun, 2018 ; and “Who is Edward Gong? Outsider Toronto mayoral candidate’s signs are everywhere … Of the mayoral candidates, none has a more remarkable backstory than Gong, whose company pleaded guilty to operating an international pyramid scheme,” 12 June 2023.)

(8) Toby Heaps : See above re dog Molly, and “I’ve spent my career working with the world’s largest corporations to change for the better, to be more sustainable.” Now, “I want to build a kinder Toronto where everyone can thrive … A vibrant city where we have well-being, security and opportunities to take care of ourselves and those we love.”

(9) Rick Lee : “Don’t be a dick vote for Rick,” “Vote for Rick He’s the right pick”

(10) D!ONNE Renée : “Vote D!ONNE Renée on Election Day to ensure that we all have the ability to live. thrive. be.” Meanwhile, see also Ms. Renée’s 31 YouTube videos on related issues and subjects of public interest and concern.

(11) Jeffery Tunney : Mr. Tunney “grew up in the small areas in and around Goderich, Ontario … While doing many operations … like reducing the amount of drugs being trafficked into high schools in New York City … Tunney has discouraged violent methods … which has put pressure on the government to clean up the environment, and fix their policies.”

(12) Jody Williams : “Torontonians!! Vote for your new Mayor Jody Williams, For the time has come to own your own home, At a affordable price … Jody Williams is and has always been devoted to the people. That’s what being a Political Candidate is all about.”

And we want to end this section with a final reminder that there are still 83 other candidates on the ballot for Mayor of Toronto this coming Monday, June 26. Some of them are just on crazed ego trips of course. And why not? So are many senior elected politicians and competitive corporate executives. Moreover, others among the remaining 83 have ideas that are worth second thoughts — which they are alas all too unlikely to receive very much of at all!

Further thoughts on the inevitability of Olivia Chow?

Everyone at our Friday morning meeting (including some who have lived in Toronto most of their long lives) agreed that none of us can remember anything quite like the city’s “Mayoral By-election” this coming Monday, June 26, 2023. And that adds further complications to the always risky business of trying to predict political outcomes in a serious democracy.

Assuming the pollsters are more or less on the money, however, everyone at our meeting also agreed that, with no apparent big change in Olivia Chow’s now rather longstanding front-runner status only a week and two days before election day, there seems a very good chance that on this coming June 27, 2023 Ms. Chow will be the new Mayor of Toronto — with as little as a third of the popular vote, eg, but fairly and squarely on all the current rules of the game.

Some of us here will not altogether like this prospect, but no one will be heartbroken. All of us would prefer Olivia Chow to any of the Doug Ford Three Amigos (Bradford, Furey, and Saunders in alphabetical order.) And having to deal with a new Mayor Chow of Toronto may even help broaden Premier Ford’s lamentably narrow horizons at Queen’s Park.

At the same time again, a final suggestion raised at our Friday morning meeting was that if by election day it is very clear from the ongoing polling data that Olivia Chow is, so to speak, dead certain to become the next mayor, a somewhat different kind of voting strategy might become quite rational for some discriminating minority.

At least a few among us agreed that if by the weekend before the vote (ie next weekend) Ms Chow seems the inevitable winner, we just might switch our still-undecided list of potential candidates from the “7 leading” to the “95 others.”

Some argue that in future increasing the number of required voter endorsements for registering as a candidate (and getting on the official ballot), from 25 to a considerably larger number, would at least reduce, eg, those among 2023’s record 102 candidates who are just running, so to speak, for their own entertainment. And there is no question that it is impossible to have any kind of serious election where there are as many as 102 serious candidates for one elected office.

Yet to us democracy must also mean more than mechanically rational (and of course accurate and fair) elections. And this has something to do with shaping the ongoing policy debate, to a point where it finally gets at the public problems it is supposed to help resolve.

We found our Friday morning meeting’s collective online perusal of the various websites and facebook and twitter pages offered in the City’s official listing of the 102 candidates for Mayor of Toronto, 2023–24, an often poignant and instructive as well as recurrently amusing experience. And, again, some of us are already entertaining the prospect of, if Olivia Chow is destined to win anyway, voting for one of the 95 others on the ballot, who we think is really telling it like it is, and saying what needs to be said out loud right now!