Toronto’s Choice: Trust, Water, Scarborough

Toronto’s mayoral race has become a conversation about who we trust when the city feels heavier than it used to.

Rush’s Geddy Lee endorsed Brad Bradford on September 28th, writing that he “Truly fears for the future of Toronto with its current leadership” and praising Bradford’s “Energy, fresh ideas” and care for “ALL of this city’s communities.”

Blue Rodeo’s Jim Cuddy performed at Olivia Chow’s campaign kickoff, giving her campaign its own cultural heartbeat. In a striking cross-partisan moment, former Liberal cabinet minister Brad Duguid and former Progressive Conservative leader Tim Hudak jointly endorsed Bradford in a Toronto Star op-ed.

Celebrity endorsements do not decide elections, but they reveal something: people are looking for a story that matches their fear, hope, or frustration.

Ask yourself: When you hear a famous voice endorse a candidate, do you feel informed, or influenced?

Scarborough Is Not a Slogan

Scarborough may decide the mood of election night.

Mayor Chow has promised 15,000 youth jobs and local hiring for the Scarborough East LRT, including 20 percent of construction jobs for local residents and 15 percent of apprenticeships for young people aged 18 to 35. Brad Bradford is pressing a transit and affordability agenda, including the Eglinton East LRT and a promise to cut red bus lanes.

Behind the policy language is a simpler question: Will Scarborough residents see themselves as partners in Toronto’s future, or as an afterthought that gets attention only when votes are needed?

For many Caribbean, Black, and racialized families in Scarborough, the issue is time. Time lost getting to work,  and waiting for opportunity. Time lost when a young person has talent but no door opens.

Ask yourself: What would make you believe a candidate understands Scarborough, not just campaigns there?

Youth Jobs or Lower Bills?

Mayor Chow’s youth-jobs pledge speaks to dignity: young people want work, purpose, and a reason to stay in Toronto.  Brad Bradford argues that youth unemployment rose during Chow’s term and frames his plan as a response to that pressure.

Affordability is not abstract. It is rent, groceries, transit fares, and the quiet anxiety of parents wondering whether their children will be able to live in the city they helped build.

Brad Bradford’s most contested affordability promise is water. He wants to turn Toronto Water into a separate, publicly owned utility similar to Toronto Hydro, saying it could cut average bills by about 25 percent, or roughly $300 a year. Mayor Chow warns that moving water outside direct council control opens a door to privatization and provincial influence.

Brad Bradford says the utility would remain public forever and has promised to resign if it is privatized. Critics remain unconvinced, and a Nanos poll for CTV and CP24 found 60 percent of Torontonians concerned about water privatization. Water is public trust in liquid form.

Ask yourself: Do you want faster savings now, or stronger public control over an essential service for the next hundred years?

Before Monday: Five Questions

Election Day is Monday, October 26th, 2026. Unofficial results are expected to begin posting at toronto.ca/election-results after polls close, with initial numbers anticipated around 8:00 p.m.

Before you vote, sit with these questions:

• Which candidate has earned your trust through specifics, not slogans?

• What does affordability mean in your household this month?

• Do you believe Scarborough will receive real investment, or recycled promises?

• Are you satisfied with the explanations around Toronto Water?

• What would make you proud to tell a young person you voted?

Then act. Check your voting location, bring acceptable ID, and talk to one person who may feel their vote does not matter. Democracy must become  a community practice.

Toronto needs residents awake enough to ask hard questions, and brave enough to demand answers.