Editor's Note: A previous version of this article indicated that Councillor Bradford has been removed from the Planning and Housing Committee. He will still serve as a regular member.
About four minutes before the news went public on Monday, Toronto City Councillor Brad Bradford says his office was informed that he had been removed as Vice-Chair of the Planning and Housing Committee, after holding the role for a 16-month course. Adding insult to injury, he also found out he had been cut from the housing-related boards of CreateTO and the Toronto Parking Authority.
“I never heard from the Mayor directly, but we were pretty surprised and caught off guard,” Bradford tells STOREYS. “It was disappointing, because while the Mayor and I have very different views on how to deliver housing — I'm, of course, focused on supply-side solutions, and she's focused on the public builder model and the idea of building more bureaucracy to build more housing — we have found opportunities to work together.”
While Bradford readily acknowledges that he has been a “critic” while working on the housing file under Mayor Olivia Chow, he credits his contrarian approach for pushing her to be “more ambitious and bold” when it comes to housing strategy.
“Whether that's the work I've done on major streets or avenues or multiplexes or mid-rise urban design guidelines and the angular plane, or even the amendment that I moved on the City's response to the Housing Accelerator Fund that unlocked $500 million from the federal government — these have been places where we've been able to find common ground and move the city forward,” he adds.
See my statement on today's committee changes below pic.twitter.com/LfEFUWSohM
— Brad Bradford✌️ (@BradMBradford) December 16, 2024
In a statement provided to STOREYS, Mayor Chow spoke to the timing of Bradford's demotion, citing the “halfway point” in her administration as “a great chance to take stock and focus on priorities, including building more homes.” She added that Bradford continues to be “an important voice in housing” at the City and on Planning and Housing.
Chow herself selected Bradford for Vice-Chair of Planning and Housing shortly after she took office in July 2023, and at that time, it was viewed as a move of integrity. Bradford, after all, had run against her in the race to be Toronto’s next mayor, after John Tory stepped down from the post in February 2023. Now, Bradford says his removal from Planning and Housing is “political and petty” and “not necessarily in the City's best interest in advancing the housing agenda.”
“Look, at the end of the day, democracy is supposed to be about a battle of ideas, and this sort of sends a signal to folks that she's not necessarily looking for that debate or discourse, she's looking for people who are are just going to say yes to her agenda,” he adds. “And that hasn't been my role.”
Bradford has been replaced by Ward 5 Councillor Frances Nunziata, who told the Toronto Star that she didn’t request to be moved into the role, and learned on Monday that she had been appointed. Chow's statement explains that Nunziata has “shown a strong commitment to renters” and is anticipated to “add a valuable perspective to the Committee as vice-chair.”
Meanwhile, the Committee’s Chair, Ward 4 Councillor Gord Perks, will remain in his current role.
“When you have Mayor Chow's administration chaired by Gord Perks, it is very much an ideological pursuit of government solutions,” says Bradford, pointing, more specifically, to Chow’s public developer model, which was passed by Council in November of last year. The first site under the model broke ground just a few days ago, and Bradford says that he’s wary.
“I think most people with any common sense know that government doesn't do things faster or for less money than the private sector. And if the Mayor's plan to be the developer... delivers any housing, it will be the most expensive affordable housing in the country's history,” he says. “Really, it's the idea that the government needs to be more involved in housing. And I'm of the view that, actually, we need to reduce red tape and regulation and create more opportunities for private sector partners, not-for-profit partners to deliver the housing.”
His departure from vice-chair notwithstanding, Bradford will continue to serve as a regular member of the Planning and Housing Committee, as well as Ward 19 Councillor. And he insists that his work on Toronto’s housing file is not done. “I'm going to continue to challenge the Mayor, because I think that's important, and I think that's what people have elected me to do,“ he says, ”what I believe is right for my community and for the city.”
