Ward 12 — Toronto–St. Paul's

Toronto–St. Paul's is a politically competitive midtown ward stretching from Avenue Road west to Bathurst Street and from the CP rail line north to Eglinton Avenue, with an arm reaching east along St. Clair. The ward encompasses some of Toronto's wealthiest residential neighbourhoods — Forest Hill, Wychwood Park, Deer Park — alongside dense apartment corridors along Bathurst, Eglinton, and Yonge Street. With a population of roughly 110,000, it combines old-money residential streets with rapidly intensifying nodes around transit stations. The Yonge-Eglinton intersection, once a modest midtown crossroads, has become a vertical neighbourhood of 40- and 50-storey condominium and rental towers. The ward's demographics tilt older and more affluent in the west but younger and more diverse along the apartment corridors.

Toronto–St. Paul's was the most competitive three-way ward in the city. Chow won with 33.5 percent (13,468 votes), Bailão took 30.3 percent (12,165), and Josh Matlow — the ward's own city councillor since 2010 — earned 19.3 percent (7,738). Matlow's presence on the ballot split the progressive vote and nearly delivered the ward to Bailão. Had Matlow's voters broken even modestly toward Chow, her margin would have been far larger; conversely, Matlow's candidacy may have suppressed Bailão's total among moderate voters who found him a more palatable alternative. The ward cast 40,149 ballots, the second-highest total in the city, reflecting both its large population and its engaged, affluent electorate.

Municipal Issues

The Yonge-Eglinton growth explosion was the defining local issue. Midtown Toronto had experienced some of the most rapid intensification in the city, with dozens of tall towers approved or under construction in a small area around the future Eglinton Crosstown station. Existing infrastructure — roads, sewers, schools, parkland — was designed for a community a fraction of the current size. Leaked internal documents in late 2022 revealing that the project was plagued by water damage and that the contractor had "no credible plan" to complete the line had shaken confidence in Metrolinx's ability to manage the project. Residents who had endured a decade of Eglinton construction with no end in sight brought an intensity to the transit debate that was unmatched elsewhere in the city.

Matlow had built his council career on fighting what he called overdevelopment in midtown, opposing rezonings that he argued exceeded the area's infrastructure capacity. His mayoral run drew heavily on this local following. For Bailão, the ward represented a chance to build a bridge between downtown progressives and suburban moderates — her housing expertise and endorsement from John Tory played well in Forest Hill and Deer Park, while Chow's support concentrated in the ward's renter-heavy apartment corridors along Bathurst and St. Clair.