Where I stand on the environment and climate
Here is every answer I've given on the record about the environment and climate, word for word, from candidate questionnaires and my replies to residents.
Don't see your question? Search below, or ask me directly and I'll answer it on the record.
TREA (Thames Region Ecological Association) environmental questionnaire
Environmental Responsibility
London declared a climate emergency on April 23, 2019. Council's own resolution names the purpose: "naming, framing, and deepening our commitment to protecting our economy, our eco systems, and our community from climate change." That's a framing exercise, and I don't support scare tactics like calling something a climate emergency to win support for a position. Real environmental protection matters, but it has to come at a cost taxpayers can afford.
The City's own July 2025 CEAP progress report shows the gap between promise and delivery. Corporate emissions rose 4 percent year over year. Council approved $1 million a year for the Climate Change Reserve Fund and then cut that to $192,000. The City allocated $1.19 million for projects and spent $225,000 of it, while project requests totaled $1.2 to $1.9 million. The plan lacks the funding to match its own commitments. If elected, I would oppose spending justified by the "emergency" label alone. Genuine environmental spending should clear the same bar as every other line item in the budget: what result did it produce for the cost?
Vote Compass candidate questionnaire
London should have strong protections for trees on private property, even if this limits what homeowners can do on their land.
Strongly disagree. London already has rules for genuinely significant trees, and that's a reasonable line. Going further to strong protections that reach into an ordinary homeowner's backyard crosses into micromanaging what people do with their own land. A resident should be able to manage their own trees without a permit fight over every branch. Large-scale forest clearing by a developer building a subdivision is a different matter, and the London Plan already requires an environmental study before those trees come down. We don't need a new blanket bylaw. We need to trust homeowners with their own property.
London and District Labour Council questionnaire
Explain your plan for addressing the climate crisis and comment on specific details to date on how London City Council has worked on environmental issues.
London declared a climate emergency in 2019. The City's own 2025 progress report shows corporate greenhouse gas emissions rose 4 percent the previous year, even as Council approved a million dollars annually for the Climate Change Reserve Fund and then cut that down to $192,000. By the end of 2024 the fund held $1.19 million, but only about $225,000 of it had reached an actual project, while a backlog of requests worth well over a million dollars sat waiting behind it. Money sitting unused and emissions still climbing is not the record of a plan that's working.
Where I'll support spending is on projects with a plan, a cost, and a real measurable benefit attached before council approves the money: stormwater capacity, tree canopy, and energy retrofits on City buildings that pay for themselves in avoided utility costs or provide a real tangible benefit to Londoners. Those are projects I can defend to a taxpayer because the return is provable. Before any new dollar goes toward the reserve fund, I want a plan that names the result it buys and how we'll know it worked.
Nature London 2026 candidate questionnaire
For new developments adjacent to the city's Natural Heritage System, an Environmental Management Plan is a requirement for the developer. Has this proven to be a useful process? What improvements would you recommend?
I can't tell you if the Environmental Management Plan process has proven useful, and that's the real problem. A developer writes the plan, the City approves it, and the developer funds monitoring for years afterward, checked at set intervals after construction. All of that data goes to the City. None of it gets published anywhere a resident or a councillor could check whether a development actually followed through. A process nobody outside city hall bureaucracy can verify hasn't proven anything either way.
My improvement: publish EMP compliance details and outcomes, plan by plan, so council and residents can see whether the monitoring milestones were actually met, not just that a plan was filed on paper.
Climate Action London questionnaire
It is important to restore funding to the Climate Change Reserve Fund to $1m per year, as it was when it was initially created and only use the funds for genuine expenses related to mitigation and adaptation projects designed to increase London's resilience to the increasing impacts of the Climate Emergency.
Strongly disagree. London declared a climate emergency on April 23, 2019. Council's own resolution names the purpose as "naming, framing and deepening our commitment." I do not support using an emergency label to win budget lines.
Six years on, the City's own numbers do not support the label. The City's July 17, 2025 CEAP progress report shows corporate greenhouse gas emissions rose 4 percent year over year, even as Council approved $1 million a year for the Climate Change Reserve Fund for 2023-2027 and then cut planned annual contributions to $192,000. By the end of 2024 the fund held $1.192 million, and only about $225,000 of it had actually reached a project. The other $967,000 sat unallocated, with a backlog of new requests worth $1.21 million to $1.91 million waiting behind it. Money not moving and emissions still rising is not what a real emergency response looks like.
Until someone can articulate the exact criteria that justify declaring a state of emergency, and exactly how the money would be spent to produce a meaningful mitigating effect on the cause of that emergency, I am against spending taxpayer dollars that do nothing more than signal an intention to act. I would oppose putting that million back on the basis of the emergency label alone.
London Chamber of Commerce questionnaire
London City Council approved the Climate Emergency Action Plan in 2022. The Plan calls for a 55 per cent reduction in community-wide greenhouse-gas emissions from 2005 levels by 2030. Which elements of the Plan would you prioritise, accelerate or change during the next Council term? How would you ensure that climate action strengthens resilience, affordability and economic competitiveness for residents and businesses?
I'd start by dropping the emergency framing itself. Naming a crisis doesn't change the physics, and it lets spending skip the cost-benefit test every other budget item has to pass. London's own numbers make that case: the City reports 94% of the plan's 200 climate actions on track or complete, while community-wide emissions are 22% below 2005 levels, against a target of 55% by 2030. A deadline is driving the activity, but the results aren't following.
What I'd prioritize and change is this: judge every dollar by what it actually reduces and at what cost, rather than bleed the city dry in the name of an emergency. The Climate Change Reserve Fund's contributions were already cut from $1 million to $192,000 a year, and most of what it's collected still sits unallocated. Money should be allocated where it can return the greatest benefit to Londoners, and I'd hold any other City program to that exact bar. The City's own modelling promises billions in returns from a 25-year investment plan that doesn't break even until the mid-2030s, but that's a projection, and I'd treat it as one until it shows up in real numbers.
Real resilience and affordability come from a strong, well-run local economy: infrastructure kept in good repair, water and stormwater systems sized properly, and emergency response funded before it's needed. Competitiveness means running a city employers can build in, with climate spending measured by results rather than symbolism.
Urban League Ward 9 debate questions (2026-09-17 debate)
We have seen more incidents of flooding, extreme heat and wildfire smoke in London in the last few years, and the need to adapt to a changing climate. What do you see as the most important climate-related action that you would support if you were elected and how do you envision funding it?
Protect people from the risks that are already here: flooding, extreme heat, and wildfire smoke.
The City's own 2024 progress report puts community emissions 22 percent below 2005 levels, with the 2030 target at 55 percent below.
I'm not willing to subject Londoners to undue financial hardship to hit an arbitrary target.
I won't put more money into climate programs on the strength of an emergency label alone.
The Climate Change Reserve Fund held about $1.19 million at the end of 2024, with only about $225,000 reaching a project and the rest sitting unallocated.
Keep core infrastructure reliable through the capital plan and partnerships where they're available, with the full cost published before any vote. All spending has to pass the same evidence, lifecycle-cost, and result test.
Climate Action London questionnaire
The City of London should establish more aggressive 2050 mode share targets when they are next reviewed in 2028. It is important that the City move toward more daily trips by walking, cycling and transit given an increasing population, London's GHG emissions slightly increasing and drastically missing CEAP targets and an increasing number of High Density and Medium Density residential buildings. It makes life more affordable for all Londoners.
Strongly disagree. In April 2024 the City set a Mobility Master Plan target of 32.5 percent or more of trips by walking, cycling, and transit by 2050, up from about 23 percent. That target is already being used to justify citywide bike-lane programs, lane takeaways, and 20-year mode-share math as a reason to overrule how people actually travel.
Downtown and other short-trip areas can support walking, cycling, and frequent transit. Ward 9 distances, winter, and ordinary trips with groceries or gear do not. London's winters rule out cycling as a serious year-round option for most people making the kind of trips Ward 9 residents actually need to make.
I will judge each project on its own street, its safety record, its effect on arterial flow, and how people actually want to travel, not how the government wants them to travel. I will not vote for a still-higher 2050 target in 2028 as a substitute for that judgment.
Vote Compass candidate questionnaire
London should do more to combat climate change.
Strongly disagree. A recent audit found London is off track for its 2030 climate target despite what has already been spent, and says catching up will take still more funding. No more throwing good money after bad. I want real results and accountability for tax dollars. A CBC survey of Londoners this election found homelessness, drugs, roads, and taxes topping resident concerns, while climate did not crack the top ten. Let's focus city hall on what residents are actually asking for.
Nature London 2026 candidate questionnaire
Have the Environmental Management Guidelines served their purpose? What improvements would you recommend?
I can't give you a real answer on whether the Guidelines are too strict, not strict enough, or right where they should be. That takes seeing years of outcomes: how many Environmental Impact Studies got rejected or scaled back, how many Environmentally Significant Areas came close to losing protection, how many projects were stalled or abandoned, or how monitoring actually played out. None of that gets published in a form residents or council can review, so nobody outside city hall can make that call either.
I'd push for the same improvement as the last question: full transparency. Publish outcomes so residents and council can eventually judge whether they're working.
Nature London 2026 candidate questionnaire
In terms of your enjoyment of nature in London, what do you see as the difference between a park and an environmentally significant area?
I'm blessed to live and work on my family farm, so I get to enjoy nature in London daily. I see a park as a maintained space designed for public use, while an Environmentally Significant Area is land left alone on purpose because of what naturally exists there.
CCAL (Concerned Citizens Association of London) questionnaire
Organizations like the Federation of Canadian Municipalities and the Association of Municipalities of Ontario lobby for agendas — climate mandates, density targets, and social policy — that local voters never asked for, while councils pay membership fees for the privilege of being lobbied.
How familiar are you with the programs pushed by the FCM and AMO, and how will you evaluate their cost/benefit — not just in city taxes, but in the provincial and federal tax dollars they also consume?
I know the Federation of Canadian Municipalities and the Association of Municipalities of Ontario as municipal associations. I haven't worked through every program either one promotes, and I'll be honest about that.
But I will judge the cost and benefit of what they ask of London.
FCM channels large federal climate and housing dollars through funds like the Green Municipal Fund, with project rules and often requiring London taxpayer funds.
AMO lobbies the province on housing supply, growth infrastructure, and homelessness spending, while warning that health and social costs get shifted onto property taxes.
If an agenda brings climate targets, density templates, or social-policy packages decided somewhere else, I will meet it with a heaping dose of skepticism and ask what it costs in city taxes and in provincial and federal dollars, what outcome it claims, and whether Londoners benefit from it.
Association pressure does not shape my decisions.
Climate Action London questionnaire
The City of London should implement a 1-2 year moratorium on AI Data Centres. There are many harmful aspects to AI Data Centres such as straining local energy grids, constant industrial level noise, heat island impacts over 2 degrees potential up to 10kms away, high water usage or other potential negative environmental impacts from maintaining closed loop cooling systems. AI Data Centres also provide very few jobs after construction. A moratorium would allow proper higher level government regulation and standards to be created before putting London residents at risk.
Slightly disagree. A one or two-year freeze treats every proposal the same. Some sites would pull hard on the local grid, run noisy equipment next to homes, and draw heavily on the municipal water system to cool it. Other sites don't have to. Burlington is currently reviewing a 20-megawatt data centre that is air-cooled (uses no municipal water for cooling) and is going through the same site plan and servicing review as any other large building in the city. That difference is exactly what a blanket freeze ignores.
I will not vote for a moratorium. Hamilton's council rejected a one-year data centre pause in July, 10 to 6. I will vote for conditions instead. A campus that wants City approval should bring power generation that adds capacity to the local grid instead of only serving itself, use cooling that does not negatively impact the municipal water system, and meet noise and setback rules that protect nearby homes.
Construction employment is real, but temporary, and permanent staffing once the site is operating is a small fraction of that construction workforce. The lasting local return is property tax assessment growth and, if the generation condition is enforced, grid capacity the entire city benefits from too. Both depend on the conditions being written into the approval, not assumed after the fact. I will approve a data centre that meets the tests. I will refuse one that does not.
CCAL (Concerned Citizens Association of London) questionnaire
London has signed onto international frameworks — the Global Covenant of Mayors, UN-aligned "human rights" initiatives, and global NGO agendas — that impose obligations, reporting burdens, and data-sharing commitments on the city without any mandate from local voters. These commitments are made by staff and a handful of councillors, then treated as binding on everyone.
How will you ensure that offshore-funded groups do not exert undue influence over London's budget, the privacy of residents' data, or commitments that conflict with Canadian law — and that they cannot bypass local control through well-organized campaigns such as the highly controversial "Climate Emergency"? And will you support withdrawing from organizations that push agendas contrary to Londoners' expressed wishes?
Londoners decide for London. I will reject outright any attempt by offshore-funded groups, international frameworks, or global NGO campaigns to steer our budget, grab residents' data, or lock the City into commitments that conflict with Canadian law. Labels like a "climate emergency" do not get a free pass on spending or policy. Every dollar and every data share still needs a local case, a cost, and a benefit to Ward 9 residents and all Londoners.
I will also support withdrawing from organizations that push agendas contrary to what Londoners have asked for. If a membership mainly exports decision-making and reporting burdens while importing priorities set somewhere else, it does not belong. Local control is not optional.
Platform (ward9.online homepage)
Your life. Your call.
City Hall keeps adding rules and fees and almost never takes any away. I can’t repeal the pile alone. What I can do is make decisions based on a framework on every regulation that comes to council: does it prevent specific harm, are the costs worth it, would it survive a four-year defence, and does the regulatory environment net grow or shrink? And I’ll keep pushing for a council that subtracts as often as it adds. Let me know about red tape that needs cutting.
TREA (Thames Region Ecological Association) environmental questionnaire
Sustainable Growth
Growth needs to go in the right place. It shouldn't get crammed onto neighbourhoods and natural areas that never asked for it. I hold new development to the London Plan's own test: is it sensitive to, compatible with, and a good fit within its surroundings. That test applies to agricultural land and significant natural areas as much as it applies to built-up neighbourhoods. Infrastructure needs to be in place before development begins, for roads and sewers as much as for the natural systems a growing city depends on. Fix capacity first, then build.
TREA (Thames Region Ecological Association) environmental questionnaire
Open-Air Burning
No, I wouldn't support a ban on open-air burning. London already has a framework that handles this: By-law F-9 requires a permit above a certain size and restricts burning hours, and the City can shut burning down entirely when air quality turns dangerous, which is exactly what happened automatically in July 2026 during the wildfire smoke event. That's the right tool for a real hazard. A backyard fire on a normal night is a different situation. A blanket ban is like closing every stove in the city because one kitchen caught fire. Your question comes down to two different things: neighbours disagreeing over an occasional fire, and smoke reaching dangerous levels citywide. The bylaw already draws that line, and I'd keep it there.
Climate Action London questionnaire
The City of London should implement a mandatory lobbyist registry. It would help promote public trust, prevent conflicts of interest and ensure fair access. Over 15 Ontario municipalities have mandatory lobbyist registries, many of which have low cost solutions. For example Guelph has implemented a solution costing less than $25,000 per year.
Strongly agree. Residents should be able to see who is paid to influence City Hall. Guelph's mandatory registry, running since October 2024, was built in-house and is expected to cost $10,000 to $20,000 a year, comfortably under the $25,000 figure cited above. Hamilton has run one since 2015, and Burlington's own City Clerk administers its registry, both without a large new office. London can copy a working model instead of building one from scratch.
I will support a mandatory lobbyist registry so meetings that shape planning files, contracts, and by-laws are on the public record.
Urban League Ward 9 debate questions (2026-09-17 debate)
As the city grows, how do you see active transportation (cycling networks, sidewalks, transit connections) fitting into your broader vision for the ward, including its role in reducing congestion and supporting the environment and downtown vibrancy?
Active transportation should give residents practical choices without pretending every trip in Ward 9 looks the same, or works the same for everyone.
For most, that's a reliable arterial for getting across the city, and for others it's a safe sidewalk to school or a cycling link that connects to somewhere useful, and Ward 9 needs all of it working at once.
Dense short-trip areas can support walking, cycling, and frequent transit more easily than longer winter trips with groceries or gear, or more rural or outlying areas.
I'd support projects that close existing gaps and keep cut-through traffic off neighbourhood streets, because a network only works if people can trust it to get them where they're going safely and practically.
TREA (Thames Region Ecological Association) environmental questionnaire
Air Pollution
Wildfire smoke has hit London hard in recent years, most recently in July 2026, when the AQHI reached Very High Risk, the City suspended open-air burning, and outdoor recreation programs closed until the smoke cleared. That's the right response. London Council can't manage forests in Northern Ontario or control smoke carried here on the wind.
What the City can do is make sure Londoners are protected when the smoke arrives: a fast, clear alert with the AQHI forecast, health guidance, and word on which outdoor programs and City operations are pausing. Community centres should open as indoor clean-air spaces too, and the City should publicize them clearly, especially for seniors, children, and people with respiratory conditions. London already did this in July 2026, when centres across the city opened for indoor relief while outdoor pools, sports fields, and recreation programs closed.
The City should also keep its own operations from making a bad-air day worse: suspend discretionary open-air burning and reschedule non-urgent outdoor work. That gives residents timely information and a safe place to go, without adding a new department or an expensive new program to do it.
London Chamber of Commerce questionnaire
What changes would you make to municipal approvals, regulation, procurement and customer service to make it easier to invest, build and operate a business in London?
City Hall keeps adding rules and fees and almost never takes any away, and I can't repeal that pile alone. What I can do is run every regulation that comes to council through one framework: does it prevent specific harm, are the costs worth it, would it survive a four-year defence, and does the regulatory environment net grow or shrink?
I support a one-in-two-out rule so old rules retire as new ones are added, safety and accessibility codes excluded, and compiling and publishing an inventory of every business regulation, its cost, and what it actually enforces.
On approvals and customer service, businesses deserve to know how long a decision will take and who's accountable for it. I'd push for published turnaround standards and a single point of contact per application. That's the transparency I already want applied to every regulation. Procurement should be competitive by default; that saves taxpayers money and gives London businesses a fair shot at contracts they may not even know are available.
TREA (Thames Region Ecological Association) environmental questionnaire
Circular Economy and Waste Reduction
London already has real programs working here: weekly Green Bin collection, four year-round EnviroDepots, and Blue Box recycling's shift to full producer responsibility, completed province-wide at the end of 2025. That shift puts the cost on the companies that make the packaging instead of on municipal budgets, although taxpayers are likely footing the bill one way or the other (either directly through municipal taxes or indirectly via passed-through costs on goods).
London's landfill, W12A, was expected to hit capacity in 2024. The City won approval to expand it, buying time to 2049, but every tonne of waste that gets reused or repaired instead of landfilled stretches that runway further. Diverting waste is fiscal prudence: landfill capacity is a finite, expensive asset, and W12A's expansion won't be the last one taxpayers pay for if the City doesn't also reduce what goes in.
London doesn't need any new bureaucracy. Any expansion in this area should come from volunteers, like with the London Repair Café, now hosted at library branches. And the city could lead by example by buying refurbished and repairable goods, and salvaging materials instead of demolishing in its own projects.
CCAL (Concerned Citizens Association of London) questionnaire
Measurable accountability is the difference between a well-run city and a money pit. A lack of clear metrics leads to frivolous spending, possible corruption, decaying core services, and a public that stops trusting — and stops voting for — its elected officials.
Will you require every department to publish clear, measurable performance metrics tied to spending, and what consequence will you impose when a department fails to meet them?
Again, not something I can unilaterally require, but I'd like every department to publish clear metrics tied to what it actually spends. Right now, the pattern runs the other way.
London's Climate Change Reserve Fund held $1.192 million by the end of 2024, with only about $225,000 actually reaching a project and roughly $967,000 sitting unallocated against a real project backlog, and there's still no clear public reporting tying that fund's spending to a measured result.
On consequences: a department that misses its published metrics should have that specific line frozen or cut at the next budget and not quietly carried forward. I won't pretend that a councillor can fire a City manager directly, but I can vote the budget line, and I will vote it down when the numbers don't back up the spending.
CCAL (Concerned Citizens Association of London) questionnaire
Londoners have been hit with repeated property tax increases that far outpace inflation — a compounded tax levy increase of roughly 26% over four years — driven by overspending and frivolous spending on non-essential items. Council has shown it will not discipline itself without a hard rule.
Will you support a binding policy that any property tax increase above the rate of inflation requires a public referendum, and what specific spending lines would you cut first to stay under that ceiling?
I would, but my own standard already goes further: I won't support any property tax increase during my term, for any reason, not just increases above inflation.
I've also drafted the Pay Accountable to City Taxpayers bylaw, which permanently cuts council pay for any levy increase at all through this whole coming term, then only for increases above inflation after that.
On specific spending cuts, the Climate Change Reserve Fund already has about $967,000 sitting unallocated, so I'd reject any push to restore its contributions to the old $1 million a year until that backlog clears. The Community Arts Investment Program, about $800,000 a year, ranks below essential services like roads, water, and safety, and it's the kind of discretionary spending that goes first if push comes to shove.
Climate Action London questionnaire
It is a priority to improve London Transit service by having 15 minute service frequency during peak weekday hours (maximum headway) on all main arterial routes while maintaining 10 minute service frequency on Rapid Transit routes. 15 minute service frequency is comparable to service in cities like Halifax and Kitchener-Waterloo. Additionally, London Transit should work to eliminate neighbourhood gaps where residents are not within 400m walking distance of a regularly service bus stop.
Neither agree nor disagree. Frequent buses are worth having where people actually ride them. A 15-minute peak standard on every arterial, plus a stop within 400 metres of every home, is a citywide expansion that has to be paid for every year in buses, operators, and subsidy.
London Transit is already adding service hours under its 2024-2027 business plan, and Rapid Transit is being built for buses every five or ten minutes. For 2026, LTC trimmed $700,000 from its City funding request because fuel and insurance costs came in lower than budgeted, without touching a single approved service hour. That is the standard I want applied to any new spending too: match the dollars to the real cost, not to a blanket target.
I will support frequency where the riders are there and the tax bill can carry it, corridor by corridor. I will vote no on a blanket citywide standard that skips that test.
Council of Canadians (London Chapter) questionnaire
Bill 5 creates Special Economic Zones where the provincial government has the power to exempt designated projects from provincial laws, regulations, and municipal bylaws. This authority could be used to waive environmental protections, health and safety requirements, labour standards, and other safeguards.
Do you support Bill 5?
Bill 5 significantly limits opportunities for First Nations consultation and consent. The legislation allows the Ontario government to bypass critical processes that safeguard species at risk, cultural heritage, and treaty rights particularly in regions like the Ring of Fire. It concentrates decision-making power in the hands of ministers and the Lieutenant Governor without mandating First Nations involvement, threatening sovereignty, land stewardship, and ongoing reconciliation efforts.
Do you support the Ontario First Nations Chiefs' legal challenge against Bill 5?
Bill 5's Special Economic Zones Act lets the province override local bylaws to fast-track a designated project. I don't find the First Nations legal challenge's theory persuasive as the reason to strike it down. That's a separate legal question from whether Bill 5 itself is good policy. My objection to Bill 5 is mine: it hands the province a tool to override decisions this city's own council makes, and I don't think Toronto should be able to overrule London on what happens in London. That's the same principle behind keeping water under municipal control. If a project needs an exemption from local rules to happen, the community it affects should be the one deciding that, not a provincial cabinet order.
Climate Action London questionnaire
Building height maximums as specified in the London Plan should be strictly adhered to as they represent comprehensive plans for the growth of the city taking into account utility demands, emergency services, mobility plans, and preserving neighbourhood character. Recently, council has been approving many developments that exceed both maximum heights and densities as per the London Plan. Given that place types such as downtown, transit villages and corridors and urban corridors already allow significant building heights to meet housing supply demands and intensification targets, individual exceptions should not be allowed but changes to these height and density maximums should only be addressed through official plan amendments.
Strongly agree. The London Plan already allows 45 storeys downtown and 35 in Transit Villages. Urban Corridors go to 15. Neighbourhood Connector streets are capped at 4. Height belongs where the pipes, roads, and emergency services are built for it.
Council has been granting site-specific exceptions that blow past those caps. On June 23, 2026, Council approved six storeys and 100 units per hectare for 3924, 4012 and 4050 Colonel Talbot Road in Lambeth, above the Southwest Area Secondary Plan's own cap of four storeys and 75 units per hectare. I filed a written objection before the vote, citing the specific policies it violated. Council approved the application anyway, and Ward 9's current councillor voted for it. The pattern repeats: Council approved 16 storeys a year earlier at 6309 Pack Road, against a 9-storey cap. That is the kind of exception I will vote against.
If the citywide height table needs to change, change the table through a proper Official Plan amendment, in public. Do not grant exceptions for specific applicants, especially when it has not been proven that the infrastructure is in place to handle such intensification, and when it is not in character with the surrounding neighbourhoods.
London Chamber of Commerce questionnaire
London now has a new Downtown Plan. Which elements would you prioritize and what results should Londoners expect to see during the next Council term? Please address the downtown business environment, public spaces, housing and office conversions, cultural and civic destinations, safety, transportation and implementation accountability.
Council endorsed a 58-action, 10-year plan called Downtown Reimagined in June 2026, built around four priorities: a river district, better public spaces, building on the UNESCO City of Music designation, and a proposed downtown coordinating authority, sometimes called a Downtown Revitalization Authority.
I'd prioritize two things this term: the public-space upgrades, since that work can start without a new funding structure, and downtown safety, since feeling uneasy or unsafe, along with traffic and parking, is the most common reason I hear for avoiding downtown. Public drug use is already illegal. Residents expect police to actually enforce that, rather than let years of informal tolerance stand in for policy. Enforcement standards don't change block by block, but the evidence right now points to downtown needing strict enforcement, officers responding to public drug use the way they would any other offence, and every public space staying open and usable for everyone.
The proposed authority is where caution is warranted: Council endorsed only the concept; mandate, budget, and funding model are still undefined, and I won't support creating or funding it until the scope and a hard budget cap are made public. Housing and office conversions downtown make sense; that's exactly where the London Plan already allows the height and density this city needs, so long as projects stay inside those designated limits rather than becoming the excuse for one-off exceptions elsewhere in the city.
Changes to downtown parking, curb space, and transit access get judged like any project anywhere: proven effect on how people actually get around, not just what a plan assumes.
Climate Action London questionnaire
It is a high priority that the City of London meet the goal in the London Plan that 25% of new housing, in aggregate, (and 40% for secondary plans) is affordable to low- and moderate-income households. London has been falling short on this goal therefore it should commit to all means available to the City to increase the number of new affordable units including leverage of public lands, financial incentives to developers by reducing fees, expedited approval timelines and concierge service team for affordable developments and use of the Canada Housing catalogue of pre-approved designs. Additionally, the City should prevent private developers from turning affordable rental units into expensive ones.
Neither agree nor disagree. I support faster, more predictable approvals and reforms, like pre-approved house designs, that cut building costs for every applicant. Both lower the cost of a unit, market or below-market, without a subsidy or a special track for anyone.
New homes are welcome where roads, water, wastewater, drainage, transit, emergency services, and parks can support the added population. Where that capacity is missing, the infrastructure plan has to come first, with a clear funding source. Existing residents should not be left paying the bill or living with worse service. Growth should pay for the infrastructure it requires.
The London Plan already requires 25% of new housing to be affordable for low- and moderate-income households, the City's incentive program already waives development charges for units locked into a 25-year income-restricted agreement, and Council has since assigned a dedicated staff concierge to walk those specific applications through approvals. That's already more interference in the market than I would like to see.
Moving forward, I will support cutting fees and speeding up approvals across the board, and let the market dictate what class of housing needs more supply to meet demand. Developers already agree to a 25-year affordability term in exchange for the City's fee exemption and concierge service. I do not support the City going further and locking those units, or any others, into a permanent rent cap: this drastically lowers incentives to provide rental units, and leads landlords to abandon necessary maintenance once the capped rent stops covering the cost of upkeep.