Environment & development law & policy. The Hands off the Greenbelt guy. Brown loyalist🍁🗳️. Tweets aren't advice or statements from my client. he/him
Dawes Rd., Toronto, Ontario
Joined February 2009
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Progressive #YIMBYs win! Toronto upzoned residential neighbourhoods for midrise & fourplex w zero parking, converted car lanes to transit-only & raised property tax 19.8% to restore services & cut DCs.
Result? Mayor DOUBLES her vote, exceeding ANY candidate in Canadian history!
Toronto has achieved SO much on housing reform over the past 4 years. Hoping tonight has delivered another gutsy #tocouncil who'll defend all that progress, and keep ploughing forward. 🤞environmentaldefence.ca/2026…
Here's what we've done so far. 🧵👇
Hope to be proven wrong, but...
Wifh the only plausibly NON-far-right politicians - the Democrats and the Joint List - projected to have only ~28 seats between them, hard to see much hope of a NON-far-right, non-annexationist government that would stop and disavow all this.
Gadi Eisenkot Couldn’t Be More Unlike Netanyahu. Can He Beat Him?
nytimes.com/2026/10/23/world… via @NYTimes
Phil Pothen 🇨🇦 he/him retweeted
I'm in my 40s. I'm a lawyer. My wife is a lawyer. We both work full time.
We cannot afford the house my parents purchased on a single electrician's income in their 30s.
We cannot afford the house my immigrant grandparents purchased on a single MTA bus driver's salary in their 30s. They had SIX CHILDREN.
For 30 years, politicians in Washington & their oligarch allies convinced regular people that this was just about avocado toast and fancy coffee.
In reality, this is end-stage capitalism. Everyone is stuck in place. It's impossible to buy a home. It's too costly to move. We work too much to have passion projects. We don't have enough savings to start our own businesses. We can't afford to go without healthcare to do it.
Thanks for writing this article @troy_closson. Would be very happy to discuss further.
nytimes.com/2026/10/25/nyreg…
This is a good one, Mike!
"We have done our young people a disservice by insisting they make safe, pragmatic educational choices. Pundits and educators have a terrible track record of..steering students into... occupation-focused majors [which] increases risk."
New piece by me at the Globe, about how today's young are making increasingly pragmatic and hyper-practical decisions when it comes to their educations, and how that might be doing them, and society, a disservice.
Read here: theglobeandmail.com/investin…
Phil Pothen 🇨🇦 he/him retweeted
When the far right tell you what they want believe them.
The solution is Land Back not appeasing extremists
Phil Pothen 🇨🇦 he/him retweeted
Progressive #YIMBYs win!
Toronto upzoned its residential neighbourhoods for midrise & fourplex w zero parking, converted car lanes to transit-only & raised property tax 19.8% to restore services & cut DCs.
The Mayor DOUBLED her vote, exceeding ANY candidate in Canadian history!
Toronto has achieved SO much on housing reform over the past 4 years. Hoping tonight has delivered another gutsy #tocouncil who'll defend all that progress, and keep ploughing forward. 🤞environmentaldefence.ca/2026…
Here's what we've done so far. 🧵👇
Mayors Tedjo, Parrish, & Crombie offered 3 different approaches on housing:
Crombie - the timid, piecemeal "nodes"-only approach recently abandoned by Toronto
Tedjo - transformational, Chow-style upzoning of neighbourhoods
Parrish - in between: "high order corridors".
Phil Pothen 🇨🇦 he/him retweeted
Also worth noting the large increase in Etobicoke Lakeshore, where Chow came within 2pts of winning. Amber Morley won by 11%. The demographics are shifting and local politicians should take note re: local issues like bike lanes and new housing. (👀 Maloney and Fairclough)
Phil Pothen 🇨🇦 he/him retweeted
Curran Stikuts, who defeated incumbent Chris Moise, wants to expand Toronto's new development charge exemption from sixplex to up to ten homes, provided they include at least 4 family-sized. He also supports giving transit priority on surface streets. morehomesfaster.ca
A big mandate to accellerate Toronto's pro-housing, pro-environment U-Turn on zoning, transit, taxes, electricity and roads.
environmentaldefence.ca/2026…
Let's GOO!
Phil Pothen 🇨🇦 he/him retweeted
Wait, we almost hit 50% voter turnout? Up from 29% in 2022? That's really great, actually
Incredible photo from Bradford HQ last night by Laura Proctor in The Local
thelocal.to/olivia-chow-re-e…
Phil Pothen 🇨🇦 he/him retweeted
“We are stronger when we care about each other.”
Congratulations @oliviachow 🙌🏻
Phil Pothen 🇨🇦 he/him retweeted
Progressive #YIMBYs win! Toronto upzoned residential neighbourhoods for midrise & fourplex w zero parking, converted car lanes to transit-only & raised property tax 19.8% to restore services & cut DCs.
Result? Mayor DOUBLES her vote, exceeding ANY candidate in Canadian history!
Toronto has achieved SO much on housing reform over the past 4 years. Hoping tonight has delivered another gutsy #tocouncil who'll defend all that progress, and keep ploughing forward. 🤞environmentaldefence.ca/2026…
Here's what we've done so far. 🧵👇
Not only does Toronto's Mayor win re-election, but the NEIGHBOURING City gives ITS Mayor @AlvinTedjo a mandate to copy her zoning as of right six storeys on all residential major streets, and as of right family-sized 4 to six-plex on all interior residential streets, with NO DCs.
Progressive #YIMBYs win!
Toronto upzoned its residential neighbourhoods for midrise & fourplex w zero parking, converted car lanes to transit-only & raised property tax 19.8% to restore services & cut DCs.
The Mayor DOUBLED her vote, exceeding ANY candidate in Canadian history!
Toronto has achieved SO much on housing reform over the past 4 years. Hoping tonight has delivered another gutsy #tocouncil who'll defend all that progress, and keep ploughing forward. 🤞environmentaldefence.ca/2026…
Here's what we've done so far. 🧵👇
Alvin Tedjo won a clear mandate to cut and paste Mayor @OliviaChow's excellent "as of right" midrise and multiplex permissions. As of right six storeys on all residential major streets, and as of right family-sized 4 to six-plex on all interior residential streets, with NO DCs.
Election night’s biggest shocker: @AlvinTedjo takes the @citymississauga mayoralty: tvo.org/article/analysis-how…
