Where I stand on housing, density and zoning
Here is every answer I've given on the record about housing, density and zoning, 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.
Constituent concerns (ward9.online/concerns/)
Making it easier to build more homes and allowing more density?
We both want young people to have a realistic opportunity to afford a home in the communities where they want to build their lives. We also want to make it easier to build homes, and add more density near transit and local shops. And a project that meets clear zoning rules should be able to proceed without a long rezoning fight. That's what the London Plan is meant to deliver: predictability for neighbours and builders alike.
Here are my thoughts. The City is rewriting its zoning by-law right now, with public input this fall and a final version going to the next council. I'd ask staff to report how many ordinary projects can go ahead today without a variance or rezoning, set a target to raise that number so fewer projects need exceptions, and publish the results every year along with approval times. When a rule keeps being overridden, there is either a problem with the system, or with the rule itself. I'd also look at the whole approval pile, because a builder faces site plan and servicing review as well as zoning, and cutting one layer doesn't help if the same question gets asked again at the next. Pre-approved designs for common house types would help a small builder too, so they don't need a paperwork department.
As for increasing density in existing neighbourhoods, picture the day a young family gets the keys to their first home in Byron. What do you want them to see out the front window?
People want to live in communities like Byron and Lambeth because of the tree-lined streets, the grassy yards, and the friendly neighbourhood atmosphere.
Now picture the house next door with four households living on a lot with a smaller yard, cars overflowing driveways onto the streets, constant traffic, and kids being bussed off to distant schools because the ones in their own backyard are over capacity. The City's changes to the London Plan already allow up to four units on a property. Keep adding density to every desirable place and, sooner or later, it stops being the place people wanted to call home.
I support the balance of maintaining the character of existing neighbourhoods, making new development faster and easier where infrastructure supports it, larger buildings along main roads and at key intersections, and intensification closer to the core. Build where the roads, transit, and services are ready for more people. That way we add homes while keeping what drew people here in the first place. (Answered publicly at ward9.online/concerns/#concern-21.)
Neighbourhoods London "Building London Survey"
How important are the following factors when evaluating infill construction?
- Height: Somewhat important
- Density: Priority factor
- Setbacks: Priority factor
- Site coverage: Somewhat important
- Traffic volumes and safety: Priority factor
- Appearance: Not important
- Housing type: Somewhat important
- Greenspace/tree removal: Somewhat important
- Neighbourhood need for housing type: Priority factor
- City need for housing type: Not important
Vote Compass candidate questionnaire
London should build new housing in existing neighbourhoods rather than create new subdivisions.
Somewhat disagree. Both approaches can work. Infill in existing neighbourhoods is fine when it genuinely fits the area, and that's already city policy: the London Plan requires new intensification to be "sensitive to, compatible with, and a good fit within" the existing neighbourhood before it gets approved. New subdivisions are equally legitimate, provided the infrastructure to support them is in place first, not promised for later. What matters is judging each proposal on its own merits, not forcing every project through one blanket approach.
Constituent concerns (ward9.online/concerns/)
Protecting farmland and agricultural use on Woodhull Road?
We had our own struggle with a zoning change here on Longwoods Road, but it wasn't quite the same situation.
Your case is a tricky one. As a generational farmer, I know how much of a farm family's life is tied up in the land. And I'm also a strong proponent of personal property rights, so when it comes to that time, and a farmer needs to sell to fund their retirement, they need to have that option. But the key here is the zoning. What a city councillor can do is make sure the rules that protect a rural community get followed.
Here's my understanding of the situation: Council adopted the urban growth boundary expansion last December, and Woodhull Road is in it. The Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing (provincial) gives the final approval, and as of this week, the Ontario registry still showed it before the Minister. The expansion amends the official plan, and zoning is a separate by-law. Nothing can be built that the zoning doesn't allow, so anyone who wants to build something contrary to the zoning has to apply for a rezoning, and council can only approve a rezoning that the official plan permits. The expansion opens the door to those rezoning requests, but each one still needs its own vote at council. That vote is where our voices count now.
But I need to be up-front about the limits. A councillor has one vote on a council of fifteen. I can't approve or refuse a rezoning on my own, and the final approval of the expansion sits with the provincial Minister. And, as you know all too well, once a developer appeals, the odds are against residents. The Auditor General of Ontario found the tribunal allowed about 90% of the proposed developments appealed to it.
According to the tribunal's August 2025 decision on the small-lot house by the Dingman Creek corridor, city staff had recommended approval, council refused it anyway, and the tribunal allowed the developer's appeal after finding it met the provincial and London Plan tests. So, any arguments I'd make would be based on these plans. You can see one such argument I've made here: https://millartime.substack.com/p/the-proposed-4402-colonel-talbot (which was sent to our current councillor and ultimately ignored).
If I'm elected, I'd move a motion asking staff to report on what a rezoning here would do to the properties and farms around it, and I'd push to have that report public before any rezoning request near us goes to a planning meeting, to use as support for keeping prime farmland for agricultural use. Since 2024, neighbours generally can't start an appeal themselves, so I'd be at the planning committee whenever this area is on the agenda, and I'd help get your concerns on the record, in writing and in person, before the vote. And if council refuses a rezoning and the developer appeals, I'd push for council to gather planning and agricultural evidence to defend the decision. (Answered publicly at ward9.online/concerns/#concern-20.)
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.
Vote Compass candidate questionnaire
London should encourage more multi-unit housing in neighbourhoods that are currently made up mostly of single-family homes.
Strongly disagree. Many of London's neighbourhoods, Lambeth being a prime example, built their appeal over decades: quiet streets, small-town feel, and the kind of trust where people know each other. That character is worth protecting. London has areas suited to high-density, multi-unit housing. Established single-family neighbourhoods aren't them. Pushing high density where residents expect the opposite, in the name of growth targets, is an assault on their home and sense of belonging. This isn't anti-growth. It's growth in the right place, not growth crammed onto people who never asked for it.
Neighbourhoods London "Building London Survey"
How well do you think we're doing at keeping neighbourhood roads safe as we add new infill development (and cars)?
3 (scale 1 We're not doing well to 5 We're nailing it)
Neighbourhoods London "Building London Survey"
Which of the following concerns do you share with Londoners?
- Staff planners are recommending projects with too many special provisions: Very concerned
- Developers are using increased density limits as a stepping stone to even higher density approvals: Very concerned
- Infrastructure isn't keeping up with development: Very concerned
- We're not investing enough into community ammenities: Somewhat concerned
- Housing needs and what we're building are not aligned: Very concerned
- Developers' applications often include misrepresentations in order to skirt the rules: Don't know
- There is too much land banking and land speculation: Somewhat concerned
Constituent concerns (ward9.online/concerns/)
Traffic on Colonel Talbot & construction of stack and pack them that will ove...?
You're right to be fed up, and staff running the show is one of my biggest reasons for running. Too many decisions follow a staff recommendation over resident opposition and then get defended as inevitable. I want a council that sides with the people who live here instead of with someone in an office downtown.
I filed a written objection before the June 9 planning committee vote on 3924, 4012 and 4050 Colonel Talbot Road, and laid it out in full here: https://ward9.online/articles/3924-colonel-talbot/. It named missing transportation, servicing and stormwater studies, density and height above the Southwest Area Secondary Plan cap, no secured school site, and no recorded consultation. Council approved it on June 23 anyway, and our current councillor voted for it.
I also objected to the 4402 Colonel Talbot rezoning on the old McEachren school site, which asked for 40 units per hectare against a cap of 30. I first wrote about it in June 2025 (https://millartime.substack.com/p/the-proposed-4402-colonel-talbot), and council approved it unanimously in November 2025. What happened after is here: https://ward9.online/articles/4402-colonel-talbot/. The decisions are final, deaf to the objections of area residents.
As councillor, I would oppose developments of this density in our neighbourhoods, full-stop. And for all developments, I would require necessary infrastructure be in place or guaranteed in writing, with stiff penalties for non-compliance, before any approval.
It's also a travesty what was done on Colonel Talbot Road North. Years of construction, and who knows how many tax dollars, only for traffic to move even slower and get more congested. My aim is not to force Londoners to hit some unrealistic target of bicycles and buses that nobody asked for, but to make London adapt to the way Londoners want to live. (Answered publicly at ward9.online/concerns/#concern-16.)
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.
Constituent concerns (ward9.online/concerns/)
Why did council approve the Boler Road and Byron Baseline development with only one parking space per unit?
I looked at the actual numbers before replying. The city's report on 415-421 Boler at Byron Baseline lists 62 units and 63 parking spaces, 42 on the surface and 21 built into the first floor. That's barely more than one space per unit, with almost nothing left for visitors. The zoning bylaw does only require 0.5 spaces per unit for a building like this, so on paper the developer cleared the bar easily, but I think that bar is set too low. Housing developments should carry at least one space per unit plus real visitor parking, and 63 spaces for 62 units doesn't cut it. You're also pointing at something bigger than the parking count: council approving a project that residents who already live there don't agree with. The London Plan is supposed to require new buildings to fit the neighbourhood before approval. And the residents are the most important part of every neighbourhood. Housing targets come from the province, not city council, but what I can do is have a say into how London applies its own rules to a corner like Boler and Byron Baseline, and I'd rather see a real parking standard, development the neighbourhood can actually accommodate, and something the people who already live there can feel good about. (Answered publicly at ward9.online/concerns/#concern-8.)
ACORN London Municipal Election Candidate Survey on Tenant Protections
Why are you running for Mayor / Ward Councillor in this election? What motivated you to put your name forward at this time?
Year after year, decision after decision, we're left helpless watching our own councillor side with city staff over objections from the community on a variety of issues, but mainly rezoning and development.
Our friendly neighbourhoods are becoming cold and sterile. Cars, yards, and homes get hit overnight, or even in broad daylight. Taxes keep climbing. We're stuck in gridlock and perpetual construction. It's time for a change, and I'm ready to bring a fresh perspective to City Hall.
ACORN London Municipal Election Candidate Survey on Tenant Protections
A Landlord Registration Program, modelled after successful approaches elsewhere, would require landlords to register their properties, helping the City identify and address issues more efficiently. Such a program can be self-funded through fees and would not require new taxpayer dollars beyond startup. Do you support exploring and implementing a Landlord Registration Program in London?
Other: Yes for landlords renting out multiple buildings or any medium/high-density building, with lighter rules for homeowners
London’s rental licence already covers the homeowner with a basement apartment, while apartment towers are exempt. I’d flip that around. Any landlord who rents out more than one building they don’t live in, or even a single apartment building or other medium- or high-density rental, should be registered, so the City knows who owns it and who to call when the heat goes out. Where a landlord already holds the current rental licence, the registry should replace it, so nobody pays for two layers of paperwork. Enforcement stays complaint-driven, but once a building crosses a set number of substantiated complaints, it moves onto scheduled inspections until it stays clean through a probationary period. Someone earning a living from rental housing should meet a higher standard than a homeowner renting out a basement apartment to help pay the mortgage. Making it easier for that homeowner to rent means more homes on the market.
London and District Labour Council questionnaire
Do you support a change in provincial law that would allow London to charge a vacancy tax for commercial buildings? How will you approach downtown landlords to revitalize economic activity and build a livable city?
My focus for downtown is on what actually gets a vacant storefront filled: cutting the cost and time it takes a small business to open in the first place. A landlord leaves a unit empty when the return on finding a new tenant doesn't clear the cost and delay of permits, inspections, and zoning approvals stacked on top of the lease itself. That's the first cost I'd go after.
Beyond that, downtown revitalization comes back to the basics every other part of the city needs too: reliable transit that actually gets people downtown, streets that are easy to park on or walk to, and predictable approvals for the businesses and housing that bring foot traffic back. Feeling unsafe downtown, from open drug use, disorder, and streets that don't get cleaned, keeps people and customers away as much as any permit delay does. Public drug use is already illegal. I expect the law enforced downtown, as it should be everywhere else in this city. An empty storefront is a signal that opening a business downtown currently costs too much, in dollars and in safety. Fixing both is what fills the space.
London Chamber of Commerce questionnaire
What changes would you support to increase housing supply and affordability and create neighbourhoods with access to employment, services, transportation and public amenities?
The fastest way to add supply without a subsidy is to cut what City Hall charges and how long it takes.
Price is set by both supply and demand. City Hall barely touches demand: population growth, interest rates, and investment flows are out of the realm of council, but the City has a big effect on how much gets built and how fast. That's where affordability actually gets decided. A City-mandated rent cap does the opposite of what it promises: it shrinks the rental supply landlords are willing to add, making the shortage worse. But every dollar and month City Hall cuts from the cost of building is a dollar that doesn't get passed through to the renter or buyer.
Growth belongs where the London Plan already designates density: downtown, transit villages, and corridors, rather than retrofitted into established single-family neighbourhoods through the one-off exceptions Council keeps granting against its own secondary plans.
Complete neighbourhoods need the roads, water, wastewater, and transit capacity in place before approval, paid for by the growth creating the need rather than by existing taxpayers.
ACORN London Municipal Election Candidate Survey on Tenant Protections
Do you commit to supporting the implementation of a Landlord Registration Program in London that shifts from a purely complaint-based system to proactive enforcement while being self-funding?
Other: I'd support a self-funded registry covering multi-building and medium/high-density landlords, with proactive inspections only for repeat offenders.
I’d support a registry that pays for itself, covering landlords who rent out more than one building they don’t live in, or any apartment building or other medium- or high-density rental. For those landlords it replaces the current rental licence, so the fee they already pay goes toward it.
Enforcement starts with tenant complaints. Once a building piles up substantiated complaints, it moves onto scheduled inspections, and the owner pays for those return visits until the building earns a clean record.
ACORN London Municipal Election Candidate Survey on Tenant Protections
How would you address concerns about large property owners who leave key downtown buildings vacant or in disrepair, impacting the local economy and community vitality?
A vacant building costs its owner money every month, so most owners would rather fill it. What keeps a building boarded up is the time and cost of permits, inspections and zoning approvals stacked on top of finding a tenant. I’d cut that friction: fast-track permits, and pre-approved designs for adaptive reuse, so turning an empty building into shops or apartments is quicker and cheaper than leaving it sitting. Where an owner lets a building fall apart, the property standards bylaw already applies to every property in the city, vacant or not, and I’d expect it enforced. And downtown has to feel safe and clean, because nobody signs a lease on a street they don’t want to walk down.
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.
Neighbourhoods London "Building London Survey"
What height limit should we put on buildings that share a property line with established neighbourhoods (Neighbourhood Place Type)?
Other: I'm not as concerned with height as I am with density and type. A taller detached house among detached houses is fine. A walk-up apartment or multi-unit building is not.
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.
London Chamber of Commerce questionnaire
London faces an urgent health and homelessness crisis. Residents, employees and businesses also have concerns about violence, property crime, public disorder and confidence in public spaces. These conditions require related but distinct responses. What actions would you support in each area, and what responsibilities should fall to the City, police, the health system, other orders of government and community partners?
Public disorder and property crime call for enforcement. Public drug use is already illegal; residents expect police to actually enforce that, rather than let years of informal tolerance stand in for policy. Every park and public space should stay open and usable for every Londoner, so encampments get cleared rather than tolerated indefinitely.
London already spends roughly $16 million a year on homelessness and shelter, with tens of millions more from partners. Before adding to that, I want proof the current dollars are producing results, not just a bigger number to point to.
On addiction and health policy, the City has a role too: it holds three of eleven seats on Middlesex-London Health Unit's Board of Health, and its zoning decided where London's supervised consumption site could locate. I'd use that role to push dollars toward recovery and treatment that actually gets people off drugs, rather than facilities built around managing continued use. What the City doesn't do, and shouldn't try to duplicate, is deliver clinical treatment itself; that's hospitals, CMHA, and the province.
Vote Compass candidate questionnaire
London should install more bike lanes.
Strongly disagree. Canada's weather rules out cycling as a serious option for most of the year, and only the most committed cyclists brave it outside a few good months. Downtown, with higher density and short trips, lends itself more to cycling infrastructure. In the outskirts, with longer distances, cycling is impractical for grocery runs, hauling gear to a kid's game, or daily travel needs. Building more bike lanes citywide won't get people out of their cars no matter how much city hall wants it to. We should plan infrastructure around how citizens actually live, not as a tool to control their behaviour.
Council of Canadians (London Chapter) questionnaire
Affordable housing is a major concern for London voters. What actions do you think City Council should take to address the affordable housing crisis in London?
Faster approvals, not more subsidy. London's Plan already requires 25 to 40 percent of new housing be affordable, and the City already waives fees and assigns concierge staff for those units. That's real interference already. The honest fix is speed: pre-approved designs, like the federal housing catalogue, and faster permits, so supply actually grows.
CCAL (Concerned Citizens Association of London) questionnaire
While disabled persons must be provided for by taxpayers out of necessity, there is a real risk that increasing local taxation to access provincial and federal housing funding will turn London into a "magnet" for government housing — attracting demand from across the region, while the very taxation used to fund it forces people out of their homes and into the system they are paying for.
How will you help prevent a scenario where rising local taxation to fund social housing expansion turns London into a regional magnet for government housing — and drives working taxpayers out of their homes and into social housing?
I will help prevent rising local taxation through my commitment to oppose any property tax increase, for any reason, including to expand social housing funding, which blocks the exact mechanism this question is worried about.
Beyond that, the City already spends roughly $16 million a year on homelessness, part of about $46 million across all partners, and I want proof that those dollars are producing measured results before any of it grows, regardless of what the province or federal government offers to match.
Vote Compass candidate questionnaire
London should strictly enforce safety rules for rental housing, even if this means some units can no longer be rented out.
Somewhat disagree. Safety rules exist for good reason. No one should be trapped in a home that's genuinely unsafe, and I support enforcing a real floor on that. But strict enforcement with no judgment can backfire: push too hard over minor, fixable issues, and some landlords will simply pull units off the market rather than fix them, shrinking supply when London needs more housing, not less. The goal is safe housing and available housing. Enforce real safety standards, but apply them with reasonable judgment, not a rigid rulebook that empties the rental market.
ACORN London Municipal Election Candidate Survey on Tenant Protections
Is there anything else you would like to share regarding housing affordability, tenant protections, rental housing quality, homelessness prevention, or other housing-related priorities?
Most of my answers come back to one idea. Renters do best when there’s a For Rent sign on more than one street to choose from and the rent isn’t climbing to cover City Hall’s spending. I’ll hold the line on property taxes and cut the red tape that keeps new rental housing from getting built and rented out.
My goal is for the market to provide every kind of home, from a bedroom rental to a high-rise apartment, to dynamically meet the demand of those seeking them.
Neighbourhoods London "Building London Survey"
What housing types do you think our policies and incentives should prioritize?
- One bedroom units: Low priority
- Two bedroom units: High priority
- Three bedroom units: Medium priority
- Townhouses: Low priority
- Small detached houses: High priority
- Medium detached houses: High priority
- Student housing: Low priority
Neighbourhoods London "Building London Survey"
What will your primary strategy be for making housing more affordable for low income earners?
Other: Cut red tape and make approvals faster and easier, so builders can respond to what the market actually needs. I don't want City Hall directing the housing market from the top down.
ACORN London Municipal Election Candidate Survey on Tenant Protections
As a Ward Councillor, would you actively champion and vote in favour of a strong Landlord Registration Program with proactive enforcement at City Council? Please explain your position.
For any landlord who rents out more than one building they don’t live in, or even a single apartment building or other medium- or high-density rental, I’d vote in favour of a registry so there’s a name and contact info on file when mould starts creeping across a bathroom ceiling or cockroaches start appearing.
For enforcement, I’d keep it responsive: tenant complaints get a fast inspection and strong consequences for non-compliance, and a building that keeps generating substantiated complaints goes onto scheduled inspections until it earns a clean record. That puts the City’s attention on the worst offenders and keeps the homeowner renting out a basement apartment free of new red tape.
Urban League Ward 9 debate questions (2026-09-17 debate)
What is your plan to reduce homelessness in London over the next four years?
Asking a city councillor for a plan to end homelessness is like asking a farmer for a plan to end world hunger. It's bigger than any one plan, any one seat, or even an entire city.
What a councillor can actually do is make sure London's own effort is honest. And that starts with real targets: shelter exits, supportive housing placements, and repeat homelessness, tracked and published every quarter so residents can see whether the number is moving or not.
It means directing resources where they actually work: prevention, rapid connections to permanent housing, and coordinated health and outreach services.
And it means council actually using the money as leverage: tie funding to results, and correct course or pull it when something isn't working.
That has to include holding supported housing itself to a standard. If the City is putting people into housing, that housing has to stay safe and free of drugs and other illegal activity, for the people living there and for their neighbours.
I can't tell you a councillor ends homelessness in four years, but I can tell you what an honest four years of trying actually looks like: targets you can check, results you can see, and a councillor willing to say when something isn't working instead of throwing more money at it.
Urban League Ward 9 debate questions (2026-09-17 debate)
What specific actions would you support to increase affordable and supportive housing in our city?
By the City's own numbers, council endorsed 600 new highly supportive housing units, over three years, back in April 2024. As of the City's own most recent report, 169 of those units are actually built and occupied.
I'd use City land first, the way our own Official Plan already says surplus land should be evaluated for affordable housing before anything else.
And I want to be clear about what I'm not proposing. Turning single-family streets into rental complexes, three, four, five units crammed onto one lot, run by a landlord who doesn't live there and doesn't answer to the neighbours, isn't the kind of housing policy I'll support.
What I do support is family taking care of family. London and the province both already allow a homeowner to add a basement suite or a small backyard suite on their own property, so a parent or an adult child can live right there with the family instead of getting shipped off to a facility they don't want to be in. I'd protect and expand that option specifically, while keeping the line clear against turning ordinary neighbourhoods into rental blocks.
And supportive housing has to come with the services that make it actually work: health supports, case management, security. Without that, it's just a different kind of failure in a nicer building.
Both council and the public need to see the numbers. Units approved, units built, units occupied, and units still safe and stable a year later.
Urban League Ward 9 debate questions (2026-09-17 debate)
At a time when municipalities face significant pressures around housing, homelessness, infrastructure and affordability, why should, or shouldn't, the City continue investing public money in arts and culture?
I'd support investing public money in arts and culture when it earns its place. Housing, homelessness, infrastructure, and affordability come first.
A city needs more than emergency response, but every cultural dollar still has to face an honest public test.
Cultural spending can support local jobs and downtown activity when the benefit is measurable, but no line item gets automatic protection just because it makes a good sound-bite.
I'd require a public-purpose test and a measurable return for every cultural dollar. When those are transparent, a focused cultural investment can still clear the bar without jumping the line ahead of housing, and without burdening the taxpayer.
Urban League Ward 9 debate questions (2026-09-17 debate)
How do you balance the needs of people experiencing homelessness with the concerns of residents and businesses?
Everyone deserves dignity.
Residents and businesses deserve safe, usable public spaces too, and those two things aren't in conflict when the system actually works.
London already runs a Coordinated Informed Response team, made up of City staff, London Police, and London Cares, that's on the street every day. The City calls this a caring, compassionate approach, but homelessness and related issues are still one of the biggest concerns Londoners have.
Council also endorsed a full Community Encampment Plan back in June 2024, including a rapid forced closure protocol for situations that need one, but as of the City's own documents, it still hasn't been fully operationalized. That gap between the vote and the follow-through is a serious problem.
The City runs monthly dashboards tracking shelters, encampments, and its Highly Supportive Housing program. I'd hold the city to actually using that data, and changing course where the current approach clearly isn't working.
Supported housing has to come with real conditions. If the City is putting people into housing, that housing needs to stay safe and free of drugs and other illegal activity, for the well-being of both the people living there and for the neighbours around it.
Neighbourhoods London "Building London Survey"
Tell us anything about your housing and development platform that you want Londoners to know that this survey doesn't capture.
My opinions on housing aren't set in stone, and good input from the community could easily change them. What I do want is to make building easier, faster, and cheaper for builders, because that gets more affordable homes built sooner. The types of homes we build should be dictated by market demand, and not by what someone downtown wants to have built.
Vote Compass candidate questionnaire
London should spend more on social housing, even if it means tax increases or cuts to other services.
Strongly disagree. Social housing matters, and the city already puts meaningful money toward it. But this question ties new spending directly to higher taxes or cuts to other core services, and that's not a trade worth making automatically. Before committing to more, the existing budget needs to be spent effectively; results matter more than the size of the number. Raising taxes or gutting other services to hit an arbitrary spending target isn't good governance. Make the current dollars work harder first.
Accessible London Coalition candidate questionnaire
How will you commit to improving accessible housing opportunities in our city?
Most of London's housing was built before today's accessibility standards applied, and those standards only kick in on new construction or a major renovation. That's why people are reporting years-long waits for something as basic as a wheelchair-accessible unit. The one program built to help someone retrofit their own home, Ontario Renovates, is funded by the federal and provincial governments and delivered through the City, and it runs out most years before demand is met. I can't set that funding level from a council seat, but I can make sure residents actually know the program exists and how to apply before the year's funding is gone.
Urban League Ward 9 debate questions (2026-09-17 debate)
If a new supportive housing project was proposed in a neighbourhood where many residents opposed it, how would you respond? What commitments are you prepared to make tonight that voters can hold you accountable for?
I don't believe a developer or a bureaucrat downtown should get to decide what a neighbourhood has to live with. If a supportive housing project came to a neighbourhood that didn't want it, it's my job to be the voice of the people living there and represent their will.
But the truth is that provincial law limits how far a council can go to block a housing project just because a neighbourhood opposes it. I won't tell any neighbourhood that I can hand them a guaranteed veto, because that would be a promise I couldn't keep, and I don't make those.
What I can promise is that before a project like this comes anywhere near a vote, residents get the actual plan on the table: who runs it, what security looks like, what happens when something goes wrong, and how they can hold someone accountable after it opens. I'll use every real tool a councillor has, like site conditions, servicing requirements, and a public record that actually reflects what residents said, to make sure a project that goes forward reflects what the neighbourhood raised. And if I think a project is being forced through without honestly addressing what residents brought forward, I'll vote against it and say so publicly, regardless of the final outcome.
ACORN London Municipal Election Candidate Survey on Tenant Protections
What specific actions would you take in your ward to improve housing quality for low- and moderate-income residents, including renters?
The best protection is being able to walk away from a bad situation, and that goes both ways. A tenant setting a bucket under a leaking ceiling every time it rains should have somewhere better to move, and a homeowner thinking about renting out a basement apartment should feel confident it won’t turn into a costly gamble.
When renting is mutually beneficial, more people open up units, and more quality housing becomes available to the tenants who need it.
I’d push for property standards orders against registered rental buildings to be searchable by address, so a family can check a building’s track record before they sign a lease.
And when a tenant reports a problem, I’ll push bylaw enforcement to deal with it swiftly and effectively.
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.
Urban League Ward 9 debate questions (2026-09-17 debate)
In a 2025 survey, Londoners identified homelessness as their top issue. In spite of significant investments, the city's level of homelessness is continuing to grow. What do you believe council has done well in dealing with this critical issue? What would you do differently?
Council has made progress worth noting. It built 24/7 Hubs that have moved dozens of people into stable housing, a Highly Supportive Housing Plan with actual staffing and intake standards behind it, and London was the first city in Canada approved for federal Housing Accelerator Fund money, over 80 million dollars now, tied to real unit targets the City has actually beaten on permits issued.
But there are problems, straight from the City's own numbers. The City keeps a real, active count of every person known to be homeless in London. In 2021, that count was just over a thousand people. By the end of last year, it was nearly twenty-three hundred. That's a core measure of this crisis, and it more than doubled while the City was building all of that infrastructure.
Council endorsed a full Community Encampment Plan back in 2024. The City's own website says it still hasn't been fully put into practice. That lack of follow-through on the plans already voted on is a real gap. And in 2024, the share of people successfully diverted away from homelessness actually dropped, well below the City's own five-year average.
I don't want to keep funding programs that return no or negative results. I'd rather run smaller pilot projects, test them against real outcomes, and get behind whatever actually works instead of pouring more into something the City's own numbers say hasn't been effective.
CCAL (Concerned Citizens Association of London) questionnaire
Londoners have watched elected officials override the clearly expressed will of voters on major projects. Council ignored the public vote against the BRT, and the city is now on the hook for a bus rapid transit system that has ballooned to $454 million — up more than 50% from the original estimate, with the local taxpayer share nearly tripling. The costly bike-lane network followed the same pattern.
Will you commit to following the clearly expressed will of voters on major projects — even when it conflicts with activist pressure — and how will you determine what the majority of your ward actually wants, rather than listening only to the loudest voices?
That is my main goal. I opposed the BRT back in 2018 before it started ballooning past what residents were told to expect. Council voted it through anyway on its own authority, despite widespread public opposition. I've also presented arguments, based on the London Plan, opposing high-density developments that are unsuitable and unwanted in Ward 9.
I built ward9.online with a public concern tracker so residents can write in and see my answer go up publicly. I draft policy the same way: my proposed PACT bylaw has been open on GitHub since day one, allowing anyone to see the entire history and suggest changes.
If elected, I'd like to build an official version of the concern tracker, with verified-resident logins (allowing optional anonymity). Activist groups can organize and lobby all they want, but I represent Ward 9 residents. Not activists.
Neighbourhoods London "Building London Survey"
Describe your strategy for improving housing affordability for the middle class.
The same approach. Faster permits and pre-approved designs lower what it costs to build, and that matters most in the middle of the market, where there are no subsidies to lean on. I'd rather lower the City's costs on builders than add programs that cost taxpayers money.
ACORN London Municipal Election Candidate Survey on Tenant Protections
What gaps do you see in the current Council’s approach to rental housing maintenance and by-law enforcement? How would you push for improvements if elected?
A homeowner renting out a basement apartment needs a licence and an inspection before the first tenant moves in, while an entire apartment tower down the street doesn’t need a licence at all. That’s backwards. I’d push bylaw enforcement to focus on the large buildings that keep generating complaints, inspect them top to bottom, and follow through with strict enforcement.
Council of Canadians (London Chapter) questionnaire
Downtown London has many vacant commercial and heritage properties. What actions, if any, would you support to encourage these properties to be occupied, restored, or redeveloped in ways that serve the public interest? Please provide specific examples.
Cut the friction. Fast-track permits and support pre-approved designs for adaptive reuse, like turning vacant buildings into housing or retail, so redevelopment is faster and cheaper than sitting empty. Streamline heritage permitting instead of layering on more review.
A vacant building costs its owner money every month; if we make it easier to fix that, most owners will.
CCAL (Concerned Citizens Association of London) questionnaire
London spent $1.3 million on the Housing Collaborative Initiative — software that was never used — with $933,000 going to a single outside consultant. Council went years without meaningful updates while the bills quietly mounted. The London Economic Development Corporation receives $2.3 million annually under a purchase-of-services agreement that is not put to tender. Other organizations receiving millions for homelessness work resist even basic public reporting. Taxpayers should not need a Freedom of Information request — often answered with redactions — to see their own spending.
Will you ensure all contracts, invoices, and spending details are proactively published and accessible to council without an FOI request — and what reporting frequency will you demand from every funded agency?
I'll push for it. Since it takes a council majority, no single councillor can ensure that outcome outright, but I'll vote for it and keep pushing until it happens. Contracts, invoices, and spending details should be published proactively, and not surrendered one redacted page at a time after a Freedom of Information request.
On the multi-city Housing Collaborative Initiative, London paid a consultant roughly $800,000, and residents only learned the details because reporters kept pulling the thread. I'd require every agency receiving City funding to report quarterly with real numbers attached to real deliverables, published where any resident can find it.
Any vendor contract that requires basic facts like cost, scope, or performance to stay confidential is a contract I'd vote against, and any privacy impact assessment should be public before council votes on it.
Vote Compass candidate questionnaire
London should protect existing green space, even if doing so limits new housing development.
Somewhat agree. I'm a staunch defender of property rights, and that includes the right to build on land that's simply sitting vacant. But green space isn't a vacant lot. Parks and natural areas serve everyone in a neighbourhood, and that value doesn't disappear when someone decides they want to chase growth and profits at the expense of something irreplaceable. Protecting genuine green space isn't a property rights violation. It's stewardship of something that belongs to the whole community. London can grow without paving over the green space residents actually use.
London and District Labour Council questionnaire
What are your ideas about addressing the affordability and housing crisis in London? What is your position on a renoviction bylaw?
London's rental unit repair licence requires a landlord issuing an N13 renovation notice to apply for a City licence within seven days, backed by a building permit and a qualified professional's report confirming the unit genuinely needs to be empty. It's been in force since March 2025. The City's own review found only seven applications for the special licence so far, which tells me it's catching bad-faith cases without choking off legitimate repairs. I support keeping it. The problem it targets is a landlord using a fake renovation to end-run an eviction the Landlord and Tenant Board would never approve. That's exactly the kind of narrow, provable harm that justifies a rule.
On affordability more broadly, my read is that London's own approvals process is a real part of the cost problem. Every month a housing application sits waiting for a decision adds carrying costs that get passed straight into the price of the unit. I want faster, more predictable approvals and fewer site-specific exceptions granted off-plan, so a builder can price a project accurately. A subsidy program only stretches to cover a handful of units, while faster approvals lower the cost of every unit that gets built. On the other side of supply and demand is demand itself, which council can only move secondarily. Making London a place fewer people want to live, just to bring prices down, would be treating a symptom of failure as if it were a policy win. My focus stays on supply, where council actually has the tools to help.
Vote Compass candidate questionnaire
Property developers should pay a greater share of the cost of road, water, and energy infrastructure needed to support new housing construction.
Somewhat agree. There's a real difference between an individual building a single home on their own lot and a large developer laying out an entire new subdivision. An individual shouldn't be treated like a corporate developer building hundreds of units. But a developer creating brand new demand for roads, water, and energy capacity should cover a fair share of what that growth requires. Existing taxpayers who already paid for their own infrastructure shouldn't be stuck subsidizing someone else's profit-driven expansion. Growth should pay for growth, at the scale that's actually creating it.
Hikma Public Affairs Council candidate statement
Hikma Public Affairs Council candidate statement
I'm Matt Millar, a third-generation farmer and an IT specialist, and I've lived in Ward 9 my whole life.
I'm running for council in Ward 9 because City Hall keeps raising property taxes faster than most families' paycheques grow, and I won't vote for another increase during my term, for any reason. And I drafted the proposed Pay Accountable to City Taxpayers (PACT) bylaw to tie City Council pay to our property taxes.
I want to make it faster and cheaper to build housing here, so families aren't priced out of their own neighbourhoods.
I believe every law-abiding Londoner deserves to be safe and protected, especially in the place they call home.
My website ward9.online is where you can learn more about me or ask me questions on the record, and I'm always glad to hear from residents directly.
Urban League Ward 9 debate questions (2026-09-17 debate)
How can London improve public safety while also supporting people experiencing homelessness?
Public safety is the most important thing a city government does. Everything else council debates matters less if people don't feel safe walking through their own neighbourhood.
That starts with a simple line I won't blur: breaking the law shouldn't get a pass. Period. Theft, violence, trespassing, open drug use in public spaces, none of that is acceptable, no matter the circumstances of the perpetrator. I expect that to be enforced consistently.
At the same time, help should go to people who actually want and need it. Outreach and health teams should be there for someone ready to take housing, treatment, or support, and council's job is to fund that system and make sure it works. But help isn't a blank cheque, and it isn't a substitute for consequences when someone breaks the law.
Council of Canadians (London Chapter) questionnaire
The City of London employs Property Standards Officers to inspect rental properties, document conditions, and enforce municipal property standards by-laws. Would you support expanding their role to document evidence of suspected bad-faith evictions or landlord fraud, preserve that evidence, and refer well-documented cases to London Police or the appropriate provincial authorities for investigation?
This exposes a real problem: two levels of government both claiming the same job.
Property Standards Officers enforce municipal by-laws, property condition, permits, the renovation-eviction licence process. Determining "bad-faith eviction" or "landlord fraud" is a legal finding, and that authority already sits with the Landlord and Tenant Board under the Residential Tenancies Act, backed by the province's own Rental Housing Enforcement Unit and the police for anything criminal.
Layering a City investigation function on top of that doesn't fix the problem, it just gives London two agencies doing the same job with no clearer answer for tenants. Pick one. Either it stays provincial, where the legal authority already exists, or it moves to the municipal level, and if it moves, the funding moves with it. The Province downloading enforcement onto the City without downloading the money to pay for it is how you end up with an unfunded program and the same complaints a year from now.
Ottawa looked at this exact proposal and rejected it for the same reason. I'd rather push the province to actually enforce the powers it already has than build a duplicate program the City can't properly fund.
Council of Canadians (London Chapter) questionnaire
The Fighting Delays, Building Faster Act, 2025 (Bill 60) gives the provincial municipal affairs and housing minister the power to create a business corporation to take over water and sewage services from municipalities. Although amendments now require such corporations to remain publicly owned, they are not required to operate on a not-for-profit basis. Affected municipalities would have to transfer all their water and wastewater assets, staff, debt, contracts and infrastructure to the new body. The new corporation would set water rates for municipal residents. This model would result in reduced democratic accountability and transparency as decisions about rates, investments, and operations would be made by a corporate board rather than directly by elected council; control will be transferred to the province; and outsourcing to private firms will be enabled. Legally, the Province can impose the model on municipalities it designates. Politically, at least at this stage, the government is seeking voluntary participants before using its broader statutory powers.
Do you support keeping water & sanitation publicly owned through direct control by municipalities?
Will you oppose the provisions of this legislation that threaten to reduce control of water and sanitation by municipalities?
Bill 60 is aimed at exactly this: giving the province more room to take municipal water and sanitation systems out of local hands. I want that decision staying with London council, not shifted to Toronto or handed to a province-run corporation. If Bill 60 provisions move in that direction, I'll oppose them. Direct municipal control means the people using the system and paying for it are the ones deciding how it's run, not a provincial appointee who never has to answer to a London taxpayer.
Constituent concerns (ward9.online/concerns/)
Matt, I have a question. If I vote for you, what will you do to keep the home...?
As is my style, I'm not going to sugarcoat it: Any council candidate who claims to have a plan to end homelessness isn’t being honest with you. A councillor making that claim is like a lone farmer trying to sell a solution to end world hunger: he may have the right ideas, but he doesn't have the capacity or the power to deliver it.
But what I can tell you is how my personal position and principles will inform every decision on the topic. My answer to your question is enforcement, plus help for the people who want it, without raising your taxes.
First and foremost, breaking the law shouldn’t get a pass. Open drug use, theft and trespassing are already illegal, and I expect those laws enforced. Parks and sidewalks belong to all of us, so encampments get cleared, with an offer of safe, clean (zero tolerance for illegal activity) shelter for anyone willing to take it. Someone who refuses help, with the attached conditions, doesn’t get to keep a public park or sidewalk.
As for the expense, London already spends about $16 million a year on homelessness, which is part of roughly $46 million across all partners. I’ve committed to voting against any property tax increase, for any reason. I want the money we already spend tied to results you can check every quarter, like how many people move from shelters into housing and stay there. And programs that aren’t delivering should be reimagined or decommissioned.
Treatment is mostly the province’s job. I’d use whatever influence my position has to push for recovery and treatment that gets people clean. Hospitals, CMHA and the province deliver the clinical care.
A vote for me is a vote for strict enforcement, with the opportunity for those who are willing to get back on their feet, without inflating your tax bill. (Answered publicly at ward9.online/concerns/#concern-24.)