Brad Bradford is on the verge of a remarkable comeback. We assess his record — and what his mayoralty might look like

“Every comeback always starts the same way, right? It’s long odds. It’s people that say it can’t be done,” he said. “I know that Toronto can work better.”

Bradford, the two-term councillor for Beaches—East York, was talking about a resurgence for the city, but he was also talking about himself.

With mere days until the election, the man who finished a distant eighth place in Toronto’s mayoral contest just three years ago is on the verge of what could be a remarkable political second act. 

Some polls in the final stages before the vote on Monday show him in a statistical dead heat with incumbent Olivia Chow, whose double-digit lead as recently as early September has all but evaporated. The also-ran from 2023 now appears within striking distance of becoming the leader of Canada’s largest city.

He’s crafted what could be a winning message by telling residents who are fed up by the state of the city — the congestion, the high cost of living, the perception of disorder — that he shares their frustration, and that they should expect better. He is promising to solve those problems by challenging “status quo thinking,” and using evidence-based ideas to reinvigorate city government.

Critics charge his platform — particularly his tax-cutting, high-spending budget proposals — is unrealistic or even risky, and claim that he’s compromised his political beliefs in the pursuit of higher office.

But Bradford says his willingness to change positions is an asset, and he’s confident he has tapped into the mood of Torontonians across the city.

“I’ve never been an ideological guy,” he told a recent meeting of the Star’s editorial board. “I think we need leadership that is able to respond to the moment.”

“I think the city’s headed in the wrong direction, and I think a lot of voters agree with that,” he said. 

On the eve of the election, the Star has done an audit to help you decide your vote: We talk to Bradford and others about his record — and his mayoral plans.

As a single voice on Toronto’s 26-member council, Bradford has had limited opportunities to implement policy.

He says his primary accomplishment since taking office is his work on housing. An urban planner by trade, in late 2022 then-mayor John Tory tapped him to be his planning and housing chair. Bradford says he “held the pen” on the mayor’s housing action plan.

The plan was geared toward meeting or exceeding the provincial target of building 285,000 homes over a decade, and included measures to allow greater density on major streets, enable multiplex housing in residential neighbourhoods, and remove “exclusionary zoning” that blocked higher-occupancy buildings from districts dominated by single-family homes.

The policy represented “some of the most significant housing changes in the city’s history,” Bradford told the Star.

Bradford has been sharply critical of the sluggish pace of housing progress under Chow. Almost halfway through the 10-year plan, the city has built only about one third of the targeted number of homes. He acknowledged that despite the framework he helped implement — and which Chow updated after she took office in July 2023 — housing “approvals are up, but starts are not,” which in part he attributed to changes in provincial policy. He said if elected, he would have the city adopt technology to further speed up housing approvals, and work with Queen’s Park to refine provincial policies that he says lead to delays.

Mark Richardson, founder of the HousingNowTO advocacy group, said the policy Bradford helped author was “a plan to be proud of,” given it was delivered during the economic downturn of COVID-19.

Carolyn Whitzman, senior housing researcher at the University of Toronto’s School of Cities, agreed the 2022 plan was a “positive development.” But she said it wasn’t as ambitious as leading cities’ policies, and Chow has shown there was room for improvement by implementing measures such as more aggressively pursuing programs for affordable units on municipally owned land. 

Bradford says he’s pushed Chow to do better this term by putting forward good ideas her administration was forced to adopt.

Chow’s team rejects any suggestion Bradford has made positive contributions as an opposition figure. Her campaign press secretary, Braman Thillainathan, said in a statement her inspiration for the traffic czar role was a February 2025 Toronto Region Board of Trade report, not Bradford’s campaign.

“In his eight years on council, Bradford hasn’t been able to work with his colleagues to pass legislation,” Thillainathan said. An analysis by Star contributor Matt Elliott showed only one councillor moved more failed motions than Bradford this term.

Thillainathan said residents — not the councillor — convinced Chow to scrap the tobogganing ban, and while she welcomed his sixplex amendment, he “made no effort” to build support on council for allowing the developments in suburban wards.

The councillor has faced consistent criticism that he has ignored his constituents while pursuing the mayor’s job.

Beth O’Reilly, who has lived near Main Street and Danforth Avenue for about 12 years, said she was “furious” about how his office handled her concerns. She said she visited his office this summer to raise issues about local road safety and provincial school cuts, and while his staff promised to get back to her, she got “zero response.”

Even before Bradford officially announced his 2026 mayoral run, she noticed he was holding campaign-style events across the city. “I was like, ‘Why is our Beaches—East York councillor in North York? Why is he in Etobicoke?’” she said. “He is not in our neighbourhood, he’s not answering our questions.”

Other residents who spoke to the Star alleged Bradford failed to address concerns about issues such as graffiti and rats, and allowed a stretch of Danforth east of Main to deteriorate to the extent it’s littered with garbage and people openly using drugs.

Bradford’s campaign spokesperson Nastassia Varela said he has “helped thousands of constituents address their concerns,” and his residents re-elected him in 2022 with a majority. She said he has made local improvements such as installing road safety measures, and has been “very engaged” with residents and businesses over the stretch of east Danforth, including his staff conducting regular site inspections, performing cleanups, and pressing contractors to reopen garbage bins and increase pickups. 

While Bradford portrays himself as a leader who follows the facts, critics say he’s been eager to adopt positions based on what he believes will give him an advantage in the moment. He’s been dogged by accusations of flip-flopping.

To the councillor, the “evolution” of his thinking is proof that he represents “leadership that listens” when presented with new facts.

“If we got it wrong, we should have the humility to say, yeah, that’s not working, and (make) the commitment to go back and fix it,” he said.

Some experts also say key parts of his platform are lacking evidence.

In what he says is a bid to make life more affordable, Bradford has promised to freeze property taxes in his first year, aside from a previously approved 1.5 per cent increase for the city building fund.

He also says he will save homebuyers as much as $18,000 by expanding rebates for the municipal land transfer tax, and will cut water bills by about $300 a year by setting up an arms-length corporation to oversee the water system. The public utility would take on debt to pay for future water infrastructure, instead of charging residents for it up front. Chow has claimed it would open the door to privatizing Toronto’s water, an accusation Bradford rejects.

Bradford has declared that his platform — which also includes a plan to “modernize” the budget by no longer using hundreds of millions of dollars in operating funds each year to pay for capital projects — would put Toronto on the path to being the “most financially responsible” city in North America. Some of his ideas have been praised by groups such as the Canadian Taxpayers Federation and the Toronto Region Board of Trade. 

Rob Gillezeau, assistant professor of economic analysis and policy at the University of Toronto, said that Bradford’s plan would significantly reduce city revenue — the land transfer tax cut alone would cost an estimated $300 million a year — at the same time he’s making expensive promises, such as hiring 1,000 police officers.

Instead of proposing new funding sources to replace the lost tax revenue, he’s presenting “accounting changes” and taking on more debt, said Gillezeau, who is the former chief economist for the federal NDP. Changing accounting practices, he said, “doesn’t create money out of nothing.”

While Bradford’s plans might lower homeowners’ bills in the short term, critics predict in the long run they could force bigger tax hikes or service cuts.

Bradford says one of the hardest things he’s done was to shepherd a controversial supportive housing project in his ward to completion. The three-storey, 59-unit modular housing development at 540 Cedarvale Ave. was in a sensitive location — across the street from a park containing a public pool and hockey arena, and near an elementary school. When it was announced in 2021, it was met with opposition from residents who worried about safety and parking impacts.

While elected officials delayed a similar development in Willowdale by insisting the site wasn’t suitable, Bradford backed the Cedarvale project. It was completed in 2022, and has given dozens of people “the dignity of a roof over (their) head” and the stability that comes with mental health and other supports, he said.

The councillor said he got the development over the line by having “difficult conversations” and “working with community members rather than shouting them down.”

Richardson, the housing advocate, said Bradford “really stuck (his) neck out” for the project. Faced with local opposition, councillors often stall for time by demanding more study, but “Brad understood the urgency of the need for the rapid housing,” he said. 

Bradford can take credit for advancing some important policies at city hall, particularly around housing, and even his critics don’t doubt that he’s hard working. 

His ideological inconsistency, meanwhile, makes it difficult to predict what kind of mayor he would be. And occupants of the city’s highest office have a lot less wiggle room to change their minds. Additionally, the election platform that he presents as bold may be attractive to voters seeking lower taxes, but in practice his fiscal policies may prove difficult to implement.

Upping the stakes of this election is the fact the councillor has at times signalled he would be willing to use the strong-mayor powers that would allow him to overrule a majority of council. Which issues he feels strongly enough about to use them on could go a long way to determining what a Bradford mayoralty would look like.