City manager warns of funding challenge
Without replacement for developer fees, efforts to build affordable housing could be hindered
Toronto’s ability to help get new housing units built will suffer dramatically unless Premier Doug Ford’s government makes up for the loss of development charges and other building fees, says Toronto’s city manager.
Paul Johnson made the remarks in a wide-ranging interview with the Star on Thursday.
Here are five interesting observations from Johnson, who has led Toronto’s public service since 2022:
A need for provincial money
Johnson praised the Ontario government for its historic “new deal” for Toronto. However, he said that funding, plus other money in this week’s provincial budget, doesn’t make up for the loss of as much as $230 million a year in development-related fees exempted by Bill 23, the More Homes Built Faster Act, passed in November 2022.
“It slows down our capacity to build affordable housing,” Johnson said, noting Ford vowed almost a year ago to make municipalities “whole” but they are still waiting for replacement funding needed to build sewers, community centres and other infrastructure to accommodate rapid population growth.
Johnson said city staff are starting to determine how much housing the lost funding could cost Toronto over the next decade but “it’s going to be a massive amount of units. It would be thousands of units over the ten-year period.”
Subway funding reaches ‘critical point’
Toronto needs to see funding for new subway cars for the BloorDanforth line in the federal budget to be tabled April 16.
“If it isn’t in the budget, they’d better find another way to get at it,” Johnson said. “We’re at the critical point of procurement for those vehicles, and Line 2 has waited too long for these already.”
Subway users are already waiting longer on the east-west line because the old cars can’t handle new technology, he said. Without federal funding to unlock $758 million in funds pledged by the province, Toronto will have to contemplate dipping into its money for new cars to try to keep the old ones running which would be a “shame,” he said.
Toronto needs to order the new cars soon to get delivery and have them running by 2030 or 2031 and, without any “line of sight” on securing full funding, the TTC would need to spend “millions upon millions, and it could be in the hundreds of millions,” to keep the line running safely.
An update on CaféTO
CaféTO, the popular patio program that has outlived the pandemic, will be back this year but the city manager does not expect significantly more restaurants to participate than in last summer’s scaled-down effort.
“I think the numbers are going to be about the same,” Johnson said, adding the program might just have plateaued. “I think this was always going to be about ‘Maybe you know, post-pandemic, maybe I don’t need it as much. Some people say ‘How come there weren’t 800 or 700 (patios last summer) and now it’s only 400 of them?’ Maybe that’s because (the restaurants) don’t need it.”
Johnson acknowledged city staff were too rigid on new requirements last year, resulting in city council overturning some refusals. However, he said those “hiccups” have mostly been fixed and noted that many restaurants received early approval for patios this season.
Weather permitting …
Toronto’s warmest-ever winter shows that the city will likely, in the future, adjust its outdoor recreation offerings to match seasons reflecting climate change, Johnson said.
This past winter also had the El Niño warming airstream, so city staff won’t do five-year planning assuming a repeat of the warm, mostly snowless season, he said. However, they will plan for “unfortunate” warming to continue.
“We may have to say that some of these (recreation) programs are really just not viable anymore,” Johnson said, noting that outdoor skating rinks with mechanical refrigeration could have a shorter season while the last remaining city ski hill, at Earl Bales Park, might be less viable.
Outdoor swimming pools might eventually be routinely kept open through September if that month continues to have summer weather including heat waves, Johnson said.
“It’s an interesting conundrum because we generally run a lot of those summer assets with students,” so the city would need to look at a different staffing model for lifeguards and other aquatic staff.
World Cup negotiations
FIFA, the international soccer association that stages the World Cup, isn’t getting everything it asks of Toronto as host of six games in 2026, Johnson said. The ongoing dialogue between FIFA and the city included Toronto rejected a suggestion that no other major events happen during the 39-day event because “we’re the biggest game in town.”
Johnson said FIFA was told: “This is Toronto and there’s lots of reasons why Pride can continue to happen … and should be part of the celebration of this, and it’s not going to impact your games.” He said the cordial discussions also included Toronto saying it makes no sense to force the city to host a fan festival every day of the tournament.
“We’re having those conversations to say, ‘How can we deliver the fan fest experience that you require us to do, but do it in a way that’s more cost effective … ,” Johnson said, “and recognize that we don’t have an endless chequebook.”
Last month, city staff projected that Toronto’s costs of hosting the World Cup have risen to $380 million.