Every Candidate

Voting Day Resources

2014-10-27T05:35:00-04:00

Voting day is here. All (two!) of us at Every Candidate hope that you'll make your voice heard in this election.

Make sure you find out where to vote and what information you might be required to bring on the city's My Vote site.

Before you head to the poll, take time to review some of the best resources we could find to help guide your decisions today:

City Council

Women in Toronto Politics' Position Primer
Now Toronto's Ward by ward voters guide
Choicestorm's candidate position reviews
Toronto Environmental Alliance's Candidate Report Cards
Toronto Centre for Active Transportation (TCAT) survey of candidates
Artsvote has report cards for all the wards
Toronto Taxpayers Coalition's Voters Guide

School Board

The Ontario School Boards' Association's Trustee Candidates Guide
Now Toronto's coverage of the school board races
Toronto Taxpayers Coalition's Voters Guide

UPDATES:

Dave Meslin has also shared a great list of resources.

If you know of a great resource we should add to the list above, please drop us a line or mention us on Twitter.

Good luck today, Toronto!

Councillors short on local financial support

2014-10-23T05:35:00-04:00

In the previous municipal election Giorgio Mammoliti was elected to city council with at least 37% of his campaign donations coming from people who live outside of Toronto, according to an analysis of financial records released by the city.

In contrast, only 1% of the money he received came from people who live inside Ward 7, the area he was elected to represent. An additional 11% of his financial contributions were not properly reported and their location could not easily be determined.

Earlier this year the CBC highlighted the large sums of money flowing into Toronto politics from outside the city limits, noting that Toronto “is one of the few municipalities in the Greater Toronto Area that reimburses political donations to people who don't live, pay taxes or vote in the city.”

Toronto reimburses up to 75% of financial contributions given to those running for councillor or Mayor and, according to the CBC, paid out roughly $4.8 Million to people who live outside of city limits in 2010.

An average of 22% of contributions to elected councillors came from outside of city limits in 2010. Less than a third of the money given to candidates came from their own constituents.

Doug Ford was elected to represent Ward 2, with only 11% percent of the contributions he received came from people who lived in the that same ward. Nonetheless, eight other councillors were elected with a lower percentage of financial support from within their ward. Denzil Minnan-Wong was elected with 5% of his funds coming from his constituents, slightly more than Ana Bailão, who had only 4% of her contributions come from inside the ward she ran in.

Only four candidates were elected with over 60% of their funds coming from inside their ward, not including Doug Holyday, who did not receive a single donation.

Information about who campaign contributions in the 2014 election will not be released until next spring.

The following chart breaks down of the percentage of campaign contributions received from within the ward a councillor ran in, the rest of the city, or from outside the city.

Note that other councillors also had unknown amounts of contributions, but Mammoliti was the only councillor where the proportion was so significant.

Research and reporting by Tim Groves

So, what does a lobbyist actually do? Here's the answer.

2014-10-16T06:35:00-04:00

We recently published a list of the seven candidates whose names appear on the Toronto Lobbyist Registry. However the post did not include any details on their lobbying activities. We've done some digging to provide a bit more information on the activities of these lobbyists:

Bruce Baker, Ward 32 (Listed as "Consultant")
Someone with this name registered to lobby councillor Kristyn Wong-Tam on parking related issue on behalf of Empire Restaurant of 50 Cumberland Street unit 17. Registered Dec 13 2010 and closed July 16th 2012.
Amarjeet Chhabra, Ward 44 (Listed as "In-house")
Someone with this name registered to lobby all members of council on the issue of creating a casino resort in Toronto on behalf of the 10,000 Jobs Now Coalition, "a broad based group of organizations, businesses, and individuals who support creating 10,000 new and unionized jobs by building an integrated resort in Toronto.” This took place between April 26, 2013 and June 18, 2014.
Anthony Fernando, Ward 9 (Listed as "Consultant")
Someone with this name registered to Lobby several members of council and city staff, on adjustments to the taxicab licensing regime, on behalf of the iTAXIWORKERS Association. This took place between May 06, 2011 and January 06, 2012
John Nunziata, Ward 12 (Listed as "Consultant")
Nunziata made seven lobbying registrations, lobbying numerous members of council and city staff on issues from real estate to the parking authority, taxi licences and efforts to establish a casino. Lobbying took place between 2008 and August 2014.
Raj Rama, Ward 28 (Listed as "In-house")
“I am a reseller of security and technology/communications solutions, e.g. shotspotter.com, marketo.com, insidesales.com, etc. I also offer consulting services,” wrote someone with the name Raj Rama in their lobbying registration. He Registered to lobby councillor Norm Kelly, and several members of city staff between December 20th 2012, and the end of 2014.
Robert Spencer, Ward 36 (Listed as "Consultant")
Someone with this name lobbied on two matters, first lobbying Sandra Bussin, and a member of city staff for an “endorsement of environmental software program: Green Globes”, between 2008 and 2009; Also a real estate matter lobbying city staff in relation to the “Giles School in Don Mills ... offering access to its community facilities for schools or community centres”, also between 2008 and 2009.
John Parker, Ward 26 This does not appear to be the same John Parker as the lobbyist.

Does lobbying activity in the past influence your voting-day decisions? Let us know in the comments below.

The distance from Toronto to Montreal

2014-10-15T06:45:00-04:00

Yesterday, we published an article examining the high percentage of candidates for city council that live outside the ward they are running in. It is not the first article to examine this question. During the 2010 municipal election, an article on this same topic was published by the National Post.

In this election, if you add up the distances of candidates for city council who live outside of their ward, the total distance is 542 kilometres, which is roughly the distance between Toronto and Montreal.

We have updated the profile pages here on Every Candidate so that you can now look up each candidate and see if they live outside the ward and, if so, how far away they live.

Let us know what you think in the comments.

More than 30% of candidates live outside the ward they are running in

2014-10-14T06:25:00-04:00

Deputy Mayor Norm Kelly is running for re-election in Ward 40, but lives in a different part of Scarborough, almost 11 kilometres away, the distance between the C.N.E. and Highway 401. However none of the candidates running against Kelly live in the ward either.

Out of 358 people competing to become city councillors, 135 of them (38%) registered to run for office using addresses that do not fall within the ward they hope to represent, according to data compiled from their nomination papers.

Of the 37 incumbents running for re-election 12 do not live in the ward that they currently represent.

You can now check which candidates live in your ward by simply visiting their profile page here on Every Candidate. Just look for the map marker .

“Many people don't realize that you can run and not live in the ward,” say Mary-Margaret McMahon, who lives within Ward 32 in the Beaches, the area she represents as a city councillor.

“People are very surprised”, McMahon explained, “they think it is one of the requirements but it is not.”

The rules set out by the province in the City of Toronto Act, do not require a candidate to live within the ward to become a city councillor. They stipulate only that the candidate be eligible to vote in the city, that is someone who either lives in, owns property, or rents property in the Toronto.

“Residents tell me they think their city councillor should live in their ward. They get very upset when candidates are not forthcoming about living outside the ward, even when directly asked” said Mary Fragedakis, the councillor running for reelection in Ward 29.

“I find even candidates who live a kilometre or so outside seem to not know many things about the ward,” Fragedakis expressed.

However this perspective is contrasted by the wide range of other views held by candidates for city council.

“Residents don't care where their candidate lives,” said Sarah Thompson, who resides in Rosedale, but is hoping to move a kilometre and a half west to Ward 20, where she is running for council.

She is cynical about the intentions of those raising the question of where a candidate lives. “It is usually raised as a campaign tactic that rarely gets traction.”

Some city councillors see drawbacks to living inside the ward they represent.

“I intentionally divested from the ward” says Kristyn Wong-Tam, the councillor for downtown's Ward 27. Wong-Tam once lived in the area as well as owning properties and a business in the ward. Wong-Tam now lives roughly half a kilometre away from the ward.

“If I lived within the ward boundaries, I would often find myself in a situation of living too close to the developments and would be required to declare an interest to avoid conflict,” explained Wong-Tam, who worries she would be “abdicating her responsibility” if she had to assign another councillor to oversee condo developments in her area.

Wong-Tam lives only a few blocks from the ward she represents, but other candidates live a decent commute away. Deputy Mayor Kelly did not respond to a request to comment on this story, but Randy Ai, who is running for council further from home explained his motivations.

“I live downtown in a condo, but don't feel connected to that area”, said Ai. He grew up in North York's Ward 24, where he is a candidate. He doesn't foresee a problem closing the more than 12 kilometre distance.

“I would be a five-minute walk from city hall, and I would visit the ward as often as possible. It is only a 25-minute drive away, if the DVP is empty,” Ai added.

The candidate who is running the farthest from home is Amarjeet Chhabra, who lives downtown but is vying for a seat in Scarborough's Ward 44, over 19 kilometres away, further than the distance between the lake shore and the northern city limits.

Not all cities in Ontario operate in the same manner as Toronto. The City of Markham, for example, elects not only a mayor and a councillor to represent each of the city's eight wards, but also elects four regional councillors to serve the city as a whole.

Toronto's system is based on having representatives for 44 different parts of the city, which can result in some Torontonians feeling their interests are not always reflected by their elected city councillor.

“Our city is notorious for having a council that is poorly representative of the people who live in it,” says candidate Jane Farrow (Ward 30).

It is not clear that a councillor living within the ward makes them a better representative, but Farrow contends that “residency and ward boundaries seem to be an issue that doesn't receive enough scrutiny.”

Research and reporting by Tim Groves

Popularity contest: Which council candidate is winning in your ward?

2014-10-10T05:25:00-04:00

Admitedly, social media doesn't tell the whole story, but in today's media-obsessed culture it is always fun to observe.

In the table below, we've gathered up the latest data on city council candidate's Twitter accounts. We've presented it sorted by ward, then by number of followers, the most followers to least. Feel free to sort the table any way you like -- just click on the header you want to sort by -- to get a sense of the numbers.

What stands out at first glance is an outlier like Benjamin Dichter with a whopping 100,000+ followers -- that's three times more than previous mayoralty candidate, Sarah Thompson, and almost seven times more than the councilor he is aiming to unseat, Kristyn Wong-Tam. At this rate, Dichter might even catch up to Toronto mayor Rob Ford (178k followers). There must be an interesting story there.

While Twitter followers or social media savvy may not be a deciding factor in a race, people across the country applaud personalities like Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi (190k followers) for his candid and witty remarks online.

Then there's Derek Power. A dashing Twitter profile photo, but only three followers! (Admission, I think that we were the first to follow the candidate). You should probably follow him because Twitter isn't very much fun with only three followers.

Enjoy the table below, and let us know what you think!

(And, keep in mind that only candidates who've provided a link to their Twitter account are included. Know of a candidate's Twitter account that is missing? Drop us a line.)

Ward	Name	Follower Count
2	Abukar, Munira	1892
2	Adeoba, Benn	308
24	Ai, Randy	15
43	Ainslie, Paul	359
7	Aitchison, Scott	448
3	Alvarez, Roberto	17
18	Alves, Paul	20288
29	Andre, Dave	357
20	Andreae, Mike	272
15	Aryeh-Bain, Chani	11
9	Augimeri, Maria	4903
1	Ayub, Akhtar	4
1	Baig, Arsalan	221
18	Bailão, Ana	5731
32	Baker, Bruce	98
37	Balachandran, Niranjan	6
43	Bartley, Alonzo	146
3	Bauk, George	6
18	Beckett, Bobby	46
44	Beckmann, Graham	7
15	Belkadi, Ahmed	151
33	Bell, Paul	81
35	Berardinetti, Michelle	3702
28	Blackmore, David	41
39	Blueman, Christopher	5953
35	Bocking, Paul	348
30	Borden, Mark	74
40	Borenstein, Josh	16
8	Boucher, Princess	316
16	Boutros, Jean-Pierre	1631
5	Bowie, Guy	36
19	Bowman, Scott	69
17	Bravo, Alejandra	1840
10	Bucao, Randy	21
2	Bueno-Bradley, Edmund	126
1	Burale, Idil	1245
19	Burello, Albina	19
32	Burke, Alan	17
26	Burnside, Jon	438
32	Bussin, Sandra	739
21	Bustamante, Ted	91
4	Campbell, John	137
2	Caravaggio, David	616
16	Carmichael Greb, Christin	370
4	Carnevale, Angelo	131
33	Carroll, Shelley	10111
20	Carty-Kegel, Stephanie	42
11	Chalhoub, Dory	26
7	Chambers, John	323
44	Chhabra, Amarjeet	1006
42	Chin, Dwayne	6
42	Cho, Raymond	125
4	Christensen, Niels	95
20	Christoff, Daryl	516
20	Chu, Terri	537
16	Coll, Michael	1235
15	Colle, Josh	36
43	Colterman, Jason	390
3	Comeau, Greg	349
16	Conacher, Sean	108
36	Crawford, Gary	90
20	Cressy, Joe	2754
1	Crisanti, Vincent	1976
1	Crooks, Patricia	59
9	Cusimano, Gus	120
5	D'Aversa, Tony	14
27	DAmours, Alain	46
16	Darby, Charm	120
31	Davis, Janet	223
32	de Boer, Eric	1052
28	Derome, Gerald	53
5	Desilets, Raymond	32
5	Di Ciano, Justin	115
12	Di Giorgio, Frank	58
7	Di Nizio, Nick	119
27	Dichter, Benjamin	114508
25	Diep, Kim	28
12	Dominelli, Nick	63
2	Domise, Andray	3626
13	Doucette, Sarah	284
14	Emerson, Charmain	449
10	Epstein, David	177
30	Farrow, Jane	2281
3	Fenech, Peter	524
9	Fernando, Anthony	515
23	Filion, John	1660
30	Fletcher, Paula	3200
6	Ford, Russ	305
24	Fox, Dan	3174
29	Fragedakis, Mary	3966
3	French, Dean	254
24	Galea, Michael	18
16	Gallezot, Thomas	432
32	Garcia, Maria	444
39	Giannini, Cozette	136
20	Goldstein, Sam	156
32	Graff, Brian	350
6	Grimes, Mark	503
44	Hall, Diana	71
15	Harari, Eduardo	1000
16	Heaney, Gary	32
7	Henry-Mathieu, Keegan	856
20	Hollings, Graham	180
3	Holyday, Stephen	17
25	Hostler, Tanya	59
28	Hughes, Jonathan	185
18	Hunt, Jolene	614
3	Hutcheon, Annette	4
34	Hynes, Mary	434
33	Inthisorn, Khamphay	30
20	Kapoor, Anshul	576
39	Karygiannis, Jim	2319
23	Kedzior, Carmen	4452
40	Kelly, Norm	90
14	Kirby, Tim	94
20	Koehl, Albert	108
14	Koutoumanos, Gus	39
13	Kulish, Taras	248
2	Lagakos, Theo	84
41	Lai, Cynthia	41
2	LaRocque, Luke	518
27	Lawrance, Robin	2
6	Laxer, Michael	412
19	Layton, Mike	17353
41	Lee, Chin	380
16	Levitan, Steven	63
39	Li, Derek	15
20	Louie, Tonny	108
7	Mac Donald, Chris	382
20	MacDonald, Charles	103
31	MacDonald, Brenda	98
44	Maguire, Paul	182
29	Martyn, Hank	16
22	Matlow, Josh	375
18	Mazer, Alex	1817
28	McConnell, Pam	575
27	McIver, Megan	723
44	McKelvie, Jennifer	378
32	McMahon, Mary-Margaret	333
28	Melnyk, Andy	21
16	Metter, Elana	96
21	Mihevc, Joe	6776
16	Mills, Terry	67
1	Minhas, Avtar	7
34	Minnan-Wong, Denzil	6020
44	Moeser, Ron	799
36	Mohebzada, Masihullah	222
42	Mondal, Somu	918
20	Morrison, Philip	65
3	Moskalyk, John	98
6	Moulder, Peggy	21
23	Mousavi, David	172
36	Musters, Andre	19
8	Narain, Suzanne	144
39	Ng, Franco	40
44	Nielsen, Arlene	4797
20	Novak, Sam	67
12	Nunziata, John	736
11	Nunziata, Frances	83
6	O'Callaghan, Sean	55
12	Olawoye, Lekan	590
29	Papadakis, John	12
31	Papadakis, George	30
23	Park, Kun-Won	15
26	Parker, John	204
10	Pasternak, James	48
28	Patel, Daniel	48
1	Patri, Gurinder	6
13	Pavlov, Nick	43
13	Perez, Alex	82
14	Perks, Gord	432
8	Perruzza, Anthony	165
18	Power, Derek	10
9	Quattrociocchi, Danny	134
28	Rama, Raj	695
42	Ramana, Venthan	7
25	Robinson, Jaye	89
18	Rodrigues, Robert	136
18	Romao, Elsa	863
44	Ross, Richard	86
38	Rueckert, Theodore	5
42	Sabaratnam, Neethan	67
5	Samac, Nikola	86
19	Sawision, George	1188
17	Selvam, Saeed	1197
35	Shaikh, Saima	15
42	Shan, Neethan	1798
31	Sherbanowski, Janet	39
20	Shermack, Kat	245
38	Sidiq, Aysha	150
8	Smitherman, Arthur	127
26	Sparrow, David	466
16	Spence, Paul	38
36	Spencer, Robert	406
27	Stone, Jordan	35
25	Streker, Nikola	40
5	Surma, Kinga	111
32	Suttor, Carmel	56
16	Tanel, Adam	204
37	Thompson, Michael	14
20	Thomson, Sarah	31585
36	Tobin, Christian	117
10	Toutchinski, Igor	62
30	Trayes, Daniel	113
13	Tummillo, Evan	47
31	Turnbull, Mark	1
18	Uddin, Mohammed	100
35	Uddin, Shahid	15
26	Vania, Wasim	25
6	Vella, Tony	224
26	Velshi, Ishrath	194
4	Vidal-Calvet, Oscar	52
29	Vlachos, Jimmy	25
30	West, Liz	275
42	Williams, Sherri-Anne	35
16	Williams, Bob	5
38	Winson, Kevin	54
27	Wolvin, Rob	614
27	Wong-Tam, Kristyn	15028
35	Woychesko, Jason	33
20	Wright, Nick	1411
20	Yen, Mike	695
28	Yilmaz, Sean	221
16	Youssefi, Dyanoosh	505

A first look at more than 40 Toronto District School Board candidates

2014-10-06T05:25:00-04:00

We've collected every Toronto District School Board candidate's Twitter profile photo that we could find so you don't have to visit 40+ separate websites to get a sense of who is running.

For the first time all the TDSB candidates Twitter profile photos on one page. Drop us a note in the comment section below and let us know what it says to you.

Hover over any of the photos above to find out who the candidate is and where they are running. Click on the photo for more info.

And, by the way, all of the candidate profile pages now have profile photos!

A first look at more than 200 city council candidates

2014-10-01T05:25:00-04:00

We've collected every city council candidate's profile photo that we could find so you don't have to visit 200+ separate websites to get a sense of who is running.

For the first time all the candidates photos on one page. Drop us a note in the comment section below and let us know what it says to you.

Hover over any of the photos above to find out who the candidate is and where they are running. Click on the photo for more info. Here's an image of the photo collection above, if you'd like to share.

Help us find information on these eight candidates for city council

2014-09-30T05:25:00-04:00

Yesterday we announced on Twitter that we now have an e-mail for each and every candidate running for school board trustee in the upcoming election. Why is this important? Well, for starters, There’s no excuse for ignoring the school board election; if you have a friend or relative with public school-aged children, it's an important vote.

Similarly, we've been striving to reach 100% coverage of city council candidates in terms of contact information. We already believe that we have the most complete open dataset of information on candidates thanks to some elbow grease and your ongoing contributions -- but we want to get to 100%! Can you help us get there?

We're missing an e-mail address for these eight candidates:

Pitching in is easy: just ask yourself "Who do I know who would know these individuals?" and then reach out and see if you can locate their contact information. A quick search on a site like Canada411 and a few phone calls can also get the job done.

If you live in one of the wards listed above, maybe you even have their flyer sitting in that pile of papers near your front door? If so, just snap a photo of it and send it out way.

Just ten minutes can make a difference! Thanks to more than 20 contributions from people just like you, we got to where we are today. Together, we can get to 100%.

More than 100 updates to council & TDSB candidate information

2014-09-29T05:25:00-04:00

This is an exciting Monday folks: we're now less than a month away from the Toronto municipal election. In honour of the occasion, Every Candidate has added more than 100 updates to city council & school board trustee candidate information.

We continually pull information updates filed by candidates to the City of Toronto, as well as adding data provided by you (which we quickly fact-check and then add to our open data sets).

Just a quick reminder: Every Candidate is a 100% open-source & citizen-driven initiative -- we rely on individuals like you: each person who contributes a few minutes of their time helps us to maintain what we believe to be the most complete set of information on the 358 candidates for city council and the 127 candidates for school board trustee.

If you can contribute even 5 minutes of your time -- and all the tasks are easy, trust us! -- please take a look at our get involved page.

If you find this information useful, please consider getting involved. It only takes a few minutes to help!

Are seven lobbyists running for city council in Toronto's upcoming election?

2014-09-26T11:25:00-04:00

Following up on this morning's post on candidate's past campaign contributions, we are releasing a list of candidates who are running for city council positions and where the candidate's name appears to be listed in the City of Toronto's Lobbyist Registry System:

Bruce Baker, Ward 32 (Listed as "Consultant")
Amarjeet Chhabra, Ward 44 (Listed as "In-house")
Anthony Fernando, Ward 9 (Listed as "Consultant")
John Nunziata, Ward 12 (Listed as "Consultant")
John Parker, Ward 26 (Listed as "In-house")
Raj Rama, Ward 28 (Listed as "In-house")
Robert Spencer, Ward 36 (Listed as "Consultant")

Note that these results are based on a name, address, or phone number match with a record in the City's Lobbyist Registry System. Records may indicate a prior or current registration: please search the registry for more information on the specific activities. If you believe that there is an error in the information listed above, please let us know.

According to the Office of the Lobbyist Registrar site, the office's responsibilities are to:

[To] promote and enhance the transparency and integrity of City government decision making through public disclosure of lobbying activities and regulation of lobbyists' conduct.

The office defines "lobbying" as follows:

In general, lobbying consists of activities that can influence the opinions or actions of a public office holder ... lobbying is communicating with a public office holder on a range of subjects including decisions on by-laws, policies and programs, grants, purchasing, and applications for services, permits, licenses or other permission.

There are two types of lobbyst listed above. Here is how they are defined by the city:

A consultant lobbyist is someone who — for payment — lobbies on behalf of a client (another individual, company, partnership or organization).

An in-house lobbyist is an employee, partner or sole proprietor who lobbies on behalf of their own employer, business or organization.

68 candidates contributed more than $158,000 in the last election

2014-09-26T05:25:00-04:00

Do you believe money plays a role in politics? Do financial contributions highlight relationships?

That's for you to decide! To help you make your own assessment, we're releasing aggregated data on candidates currently running for Toronto city council who made a campaign contribution during the period of 2010 to 2013.

The table below pulls together public data that is available from the City Clerks Office, Election & Registry Services, available from the Toronto open data portal, and shows those individuals who:

made a financial contribution or equivalent in goods/services to any election campaign between the period of 2010 to 2013. This dataset identifies those who contributed a combined amount of $100 or more to an election campaign. The disclosure of this information is authorized under the Municipal Elections Act, 1996.

We've added this information, as well as contributions from the 2006 election period, to each of the candidate pages here at Every Candidate.

We'll let you do the analysis and look for the patterns. Let us know what you think.

Please note that this information is based on name matches only. As always, if you see an error in the data, please let us know.

You can download the raw data here.

Exploring the race for Toronto District School Board trustee

2014-09-25T04:25:00-04:00

The following table breaks down the 127 candidates for Toroto District School Board and shows how many are running in each of the 22 school wards.

There is an average of six candidates running for each position. There are 10 individuals seeking the seat in school ward 18, Scarborough - Southwest.

Incumbents are running for re-election in 77% of Toronto's school wards. There are five wards where no incumbent is running.

In the table below you can follow the links to examine the school board trustee candidates for each ward in more detail.

You can download the raw data here.

Women in Toronto Politics launches the Position Primer

2014-09-24T06:05:00-04:00

Just in case you didn't catch the big news yesterday: the tireless folks at Women in Toronto Politics launched their incredible Position Primer yesterday. Just stop reading now and go have a look -- it's amazing.

If you're still reading, we can tell you that it's an incredible resource for Toronto residents who are keen to compare candidates running in their ward on key issues. Candidates had to keep their responses short, which is the real innovation here: Bite-sized, side-by-side comparison.

We like the project so much that we've added a link directly from Every Candidate's ward pages to the matching ward page on the Position Primer.

On a side note, Every Candidate crashed the Position Primer launch party last night (actually, we were invited, I swear) and had the opportunity to meet and congratulate some of the fine folks who were involved. Once again, congrats on an amazing project!

Metro Morning segment on Every Candidate

2014-09-24T05:24:00-04:00

Much to its surpise, Every Candidate got to hang out with CBC's Matt Galloway yesterday morning.

If you, like Every Candidate, find the idea of getting up before noon frightening and didn't catch the segment on Metro Morning at the terrifying hour of 7:25AM, here it is for all of your listening pleasure:

You're welcome.

Toronto District School Board candidates posted

2014-09-23T07:30:00-04:00

Just a quick note to mention that we've posted the inital data for the 127 Toronto District School Board trustee candidates that are running in Toronto's 22 school wards.

Don't get your hopes up just yet: the data provided by trustee candidates to the city is quite thin and we have yet to begin our research process on these candidates.

It's a start. If you'd like to help out with the research, please get in touch.

Don't recycle those campaign flyers just yet: Send them to Every Candidate.

2014-09-23T02:45:00-04:00

Here at Every Candidate we would really like to present you, our faithful readers, with a big, colourful map of the city's election candidates -- but we need your help to make it happen. Don't worry, we're not asking for money.

It's a simple ask, in fact: you can help by just gathering up one of those campaign flyers that are probably accumulating in your mailbox or are on route to your recycling bin, snap a photo of it (front and back please), and send the photos to us. We'll take it from there.

We'll take those digital snapshots of the campaign flyers and upload them right onto each candidate's page here at Every Candidate. And, while we're doing that, we'll also add your name to our hall of fame.

Think about it: one-stop shopping for Toronto election campaign literature and zero (additional) waste. How amazing is that?

If we get enough campaign flyers, we'll stitch them together (digitally of course, because we're allergic to paper) to make an interesting visual thingamabob with them (yes, that's a technical term). More than just helping your neighbours and other Toronto residents, you'll be creating an art installation of epic proportions! That's a pretty big impact for just e-mailing us a photo or two.

So, what are you waiting for?

Exploring the race for city council

2014-09-23T02:30:00-04:00

The following table breaks down the 358 candidates for city council and shows how many are running in each of the 44 wards.

Some wards have only three or four candidates running, while 15 wards have 10 or more candidates in the race. Ward 20, Trinity—Spadina, has 22 candidates contending for the seat.

Incumbents are running for re-election in 84% of Toronto's wards. There are seven wards where no incumbent is running. The people elected in these seven wards could have a significant impact on the policies of Toronto's next city council.

In the table below you can follow the links to examine the candidates for each ward in more detail.

You can download the raw data here.

Introducing Every Candidate: 358 for councillor, 127 for trustee, no mayors.

2014-09-22T00:00:00-04:00

A week later than planned, and about 10% as ambitious, but here we are: the public launch of the Every Candidate project for the Toronto municipal election. This is what we believe to be the most complete set of information on 358 candidates for city council across Toronto's 44 wards. This is an exciting Monday.

Every Candidate is a wildly aspirational project to explore what the 485 individuals running for the position of councillor or school trustee tell us about city they seek to represent. Who are they? What is their background? What does their campaign material have to say? What do public records reveal?

There are all kinds of questions that this project aspires to answer -- some quirky, some hopelessly esoteric -- but, at the same time, we hope that this project asks questions that also interest you, as a resident of Toronto. Whether you are a concerned citizen or a parent, Every Candidate hopes that we can help play a small part in your election-day research.

Today we are releasing the information that we've collected on 358 candidates for city council across Toronto's 44 wards. In the coming days, we will also release information on the 127 trustee candidates for Toronto District School Board. Beyond the raw data, we aim to publish some non-partisan analysis and fun Toronto election tidbits -- not "scoops" per se, but interesting stories in the data.

This site itself, and all of the data it relies on, are publicly available to improve upon, remix, re-use, and re-distribute. If you see an omission or error in the data, please take a minute to let us know.

You'll notice the conspicuous absence of information about the 65 individuals running for the office of mayor. That is deliberate and at the core of what Every Candidate is about. We are fascinated by the question of what people running public office could tell us about a city as a whole, and -- with limited time & resources -- we decided to focus on candidates for councillor and school trustee, the 485 individuals running for positions that serve more than 2.5M residents of Toronto.

We have full confidence that you'll hear more than enough about the individuals running for the position of mayor, or at least those few that are anointed as "electable" by mainstream news sources.

The other positions on the Toronto Catholic District School Board, Conseil scolaire Viamonde, and Conseil scolaire de district catholique Centre-Sud -- while no less important -- simply provide diminishing returns on the time investment to investigate thoroughly. That said, if you're passionate about those positions, please join our (volunteer) team.

Speaking of joining the team: if you've got a passion for municipal politics, research skills, and some time on your hands, please take a minute to scan our get involved page.

Here we go. This is going to be fun.

Every Candidate

Voting Day Resources

City Council

School Board

Councillors short on local financial support

So, what does a lobbyist *actually* do? Here's the answer.

The distance from Toronto to Montreal

More than 30% of candidates live outside the ward they are running in

Popularity contest: Which council candidate is winning in your ward?

A first look at more than 40 Toronto District School Board candidates

A first look at more than 200 city council candidates

Help us find information on these eight candidates for city council

More than 100 updates to council & TDSB candidate information

Are seven lobbyists running for city council in Toronto's upcoming election?

68 candidates contributed more than $158,000 in the last election

Exploring the race for Toronto District School Board trustee

Women in Toronto Politics launches the Position Primer

Metro Morning segment on Every Candidate

Toronto District School Board candidates posted

Don't recycle those campaign flyers just yet: Send them to Every Candidate.

Exploring the race for city council

Introducing Every Candidate: 358 for councillor, 127 for trustee, no mayors.

So, what does a lobbyist actually do? Here's the answer.