What to know
- Chow’s campaign centred on building trust with voters while making affordability and the rising cost of living key issues, campaign manager Karla Webber-Gallagher explained.
- The race tightened after Chris Alexander dropped out, prompting the campaign to sharpen its contrasts with Brad Bradford while sticking to its core message.
- The campaign focused on strengthening Chow’s relationship with Scarborough residents and highlighting projects such as the Scarborough Busway.
- Thousands of volunteers helped power the campaign, including approximately 2,000 people involved in its election-day get-out-the-vote operation.
It’s been nearly two weeks since Olivia Chow secured a historic victory in Toronto’s municipal election, earning more than 532,000 votes, the highest number ever received by a single politician in Canadian history.
For Karla Webber-Gallagher, Chow’s campaign manager, the result speaks to the mayor’s connection with Toronto residents and the work that went into building that relationship.
Webber-Gallagher says preparations for the campaign began well before election season, but she officially started working on it full-time on Aug. 10, spending nearly three months navigating the demands of a citywide race.
At its core, she says the campaign was built around one central question: Who can Toronto residents trust?
“She’s been around for a long time. She’s been elected for a long time, and she’s somebody who I think has always kind of been true to who she says she is,” Webber-Gallagher said.
But establishing trust was only part of the strategy. The campaign also needed to connect with voters on the issues affecting their everyday lives.
Making affordability a central campaign issue
Webber-Gallagher says affordability and the rising cost of living had been prominent concerns in public opinion polling for years, making them a natural focus for the campaign.
That approach was reflected in some of Chow’s biggest campaign promises, including introducing a TTC fare cap after 10 rides a week and expanding the city’s School Food Program to provide free lunches to all students.
Webber-Gallagher says the goal was to build a tangible offer that residents could see making a difference in their everyday lives.
“When you think about fare capping at 10 rides, even just getting three rides a week for free would save a rider like $1,000 a year,” she said.
She also pointed to the proposed expansion of the School Food Program, saying it would offer relief not only from grocery costs but also from the time parents spend preparing meals and packing lunches.
Ultimately, she believes combining those practical affordability measures with the mayor’s established reputation helped create a winning campaign.
How the campaign navigated a tightening race
While the campaign had a clear framework, Webber-Gallagher says municipal elections require constant adjustments as candidates respond to developments on the campaign trail.
One of the biggest changes came when Chris Alexander dropped out of the mayoral race, turning what had been a three-way contest into a head-to-head battle between Chow and Brad Bradford.
Webber-Gallagher says the departure forced her to reconsider how the remainder of the campaign might unfold.
“I think a two-way race is always more challenging, right? There’s always kind of a bit more of a head-to-head battle. It is something that you have to approach differently, maybe than a multi-candidate race,” she said.
She says the campaign anticipated that the race would tighten following Alexander’s departure, particularly because she believed both Alexander and Bradford were drawing support from similar groups of more conservative voters.
That shift became increasingly apparent in the final stretch, as polling results showed the two leading candidates trading leads and the outcome becoming more difficult to predict.
Rather than overhaul its strategy, Webber-Gallagher says the campaign stayed focused on its original message of trust, using Bradford’s own announcements and past council positions to draw contrasts between the candidates.
She pointed to Bradford’s proposed independent, line-by-line review of the city’s core services and spending, which Chow’s campaign argued could lead to cuts to public services.
The campaign also leaned into what Webber-Gallagher described as a broader narrative about Bradford changing his positions on issues, including the debate surrounding bike lanes.
She says the team ultimately held steady with that approach, and began noticing a momentum shift back towards Chow in the final 10 days of the campaign.
Interestingly, Webber-Gallagher says the narrowing polls may have helped the incumbent by encouraging more residents to pay attention to a race they initially believed would be an easier victory for Chow.
“People started tuning in,” she said. “There was a shift that you could just feel.”
Why Scarborough was a key battleground
Another important part of Chow’s campaign was maintaining and strengthening her relationship with Scarborough residents.
Webber-Gallagher describes the area as a key battleground, saying the campaign understood that the mayor needed to be visible there throughout the election period.
But she says simply showing up in Scarborough wasn’t enough. The campaign wanted to demonstrate what Chow had delivered during her first term.
She pointed to the Scarborough Busway as one example, saying the mayor was able to speak directly with residents about a project that had moved forward relatively quickly by the city’s infrastructure standards.
Webber-Gallagher says she frequently heard residents speak warmly about Chow, describing her as someone who had maintained a presence in their communities beyond election season.
“There was kind of this feeling that she doesn’t just show up during elections. She’s always been here. She’s always in Scarborough,” she said.
She believes that familiarity, combined with the mayor’s record of investment and attention to the area, helped encourage Scarborough residents to support Chow at advance polls and on election day.
Thousands of volunteers helped power the campaign
Beyond the mayor’s platform and campaign messaging, Webber-Gallagher says grassroots organizing played a significant role in securing the victory.
She describes Chow as someone who fundamentally believes in community organizing and bringing people into the political process, a philosophy that carried through to the campaign.
The team mobilized thousands of volunteers, built networks within different communities and organized outreach efforts among groups including renters.
On election day alone, she says approximately 2,000 people helped with the campaign’s get-out-the-vote operation.
Webber-Gallagher says the campaign also spoke with a record number of residents throughout the election period, with those one-on-one conversations ultimately helping motivate people to cast their ballots.
She says the campaign made a point of reaching all voters, including those who may not have traditionally supported Chow.
For those voters, she says the opportunity was to address their concerns directly, challenge narratives coming from opposing campaigns and explain what Chow intended to deliver during another term.
Why the campaign stood by its promises
Chow’s platform also faced criticism from those who questioned whether the mayor was being ambitious enough, particularly as Bradford announced new campaign promises throughout the election.
Webber-Gallagher says that criticism was frustrating, arguing that the campaign deliberately prioritized proposals that would have a tangible impact on residents rather than simply focusing on the number of announcements.
She says the affordability-focused platform was designed around the realities of working people who could benefit from some relief in their household budgets.
“It is bold to think about a PSW going to 10 different locations a day on transit, and what it means to that person to have a fare cap,” she said.
“I think talking to regular people in the city, the mayor’s proposals were extremely bold and will be very impactful to working folks.”
Looking back, Webber-Gallagher says there isn’t anything in particular she would have changed about the campaign.
She believes the team made an effort to reach every corner of Toronto, including communities where the mayor faced greater criticism or had less support.
And while the campaign’s final vote count exceeded what its internal projections had anticipated, she says the team remained confident in its strategy even as the race tightened.
“We kind of touched every corner of the city. We reached out to so many people. We didn’t shy away from areas where maybe there was more commentary,” she said.
