Toronto ACORN and allies successfully push for a draft maximum heat bylaw by summer 2026

Toronto, Ontario — Toronto ACORN members are celebrating after the City of Toronto’s Executive Committee passed a motion directing City staff to write a draft maximum heat bylaw and present it to City Council no later than July 2026, after the proposal for a bylaw risked stalling until 2027.

In December 2024, Toronto ACORN, alongside the Canadian Environmental Law Association, the Toronto Environmental Alliance and many others, advocated for City staff to start creating a bylaw that would compel landlords and property managers in the city to ensure their apartment units are kept below 26ºC. This is an essential health intervention at a time when Toronto is facing worsening effects of climate change, including brutal heat waves every summer. These heat waves affect everyone, but low-income people, tenants, seniors, children, and people with disabilities and chronic health conditions are particularly susceptible to heat-related illnesses and deaths.

At the time, the motion proposed reporting back on the proposal in the fourth quarter of 2025! Tenants were frustrated and told the City to move faster, but City staff insisted that they needed time to get this “right by tenants” and ensure they get “what they need and what they deserve.” Which brings us to today.

Yesterday, a year after the passage of that motion, City staff returned to Council with their report. They didn’t write a draft bylaw during that year. Instead, they were asking for another year to further study the issue, including if and how costs of building retrofits would be passed onto tenants through rent increases. This would only kick the can further down the road while vulnerable people suffer and die due to extreme heat. Toronto ACORN members attended an Executive Committee meeting yesterday, where Marcia Stone, chair of Weston ACORN, told the Mayor and Councillors: tenants can’t wait until 2027 to see a draft of this bylaw.

Mayor Olivia Chow heard the concerns brought forward by ACORN and many other advocates. At yesterday’s meeting, she moved an amendment that would direct City staff to return with a draft bylaw no later than July 2026, while studying the issue of rent hikes at the same time and how to avoid costs being passed onto tenants. Toronto ACORN believes that the City can walk and chew gum at the same time, and ACORN members were very pleased to see the Mayor’s urgency and to see the motion pass.

While we wait for summer 2026 to see what the draft bylaw looks like, Toronto ACORN members are gearing up for the City’s annual budget consultations in January 2026, getting ready to advocate for a fivefold expansion of the City’s successful free air conditioner program and free TTC rides on extreme heat days.

Want to get involved in ACORN’s Beat the Heat campaign? Or learn how to make a deputation to the Budget Committee on issues that matter to your community? Contact the Toronto ACORN office at (416) 461-9233 or [email protected] to get involved!