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This website is run by volunteer members and community activists at ClimateFast. ClimateFast is a volunteer-based, community organization dedicated to building strong, informed public pressure to take urgent, substantial, and just action on climate change. For more information, please visit the ClimateFast website.

Additionally, this website involved collaboration with members from other Toronto grassroots groups including Etobicoke Climate Action, For Our Kids Toronto, TTCriders, and others. A huge and special thanks to Progress Toronto and Civic Tech Toronto for their continuous support and guidance. This climate voting records website was built from scratch and is powered by webCOMAND.

Because this website is completely volunteer-run, there may be delays in updating the most recent climate-related motions passed by City Council. If you are interested in helping keep this volunteer-run website up to date, please contact us at info@climatefast.ca. We look forward to hearing from you!

Yes. Please contact info@climatefast.ca and let us know that you are interested in helping with the project.

For councillors who are no longer on City Council, we have included a label to indicate that they are “inactive”, while councillors who are still on City Council are labelled as “active”. If you notice that a councillor has been mislabeled, please contact us at info@climatefast.ca.

The scope of the ‘climate-related’ items on this website is based on items deemed to support the City’s TransformTO Net Zero by 2040. For the initial website launch, the items focus mostly on the buildings, transportation, and energy related policies. In the future, we plan to update the website to include the full range of items that align with the City’s TransformTO Net Zero by 2040 Strategy and the City’s Resilience Strategy. This includes policies on building densification, natural systems, circular economies, and social policies. For more details on the scoping of items, please see the ‘About this Website’ tab near the bottom left hand corner of this site.

No, the website does not provide a complete list yet. Currently, it includes items dating back to 2019. As the site progresses, we plan to expand this to cover items dating back to 2006. Second, most of the items presented on the website are in the buildings, energy, and transportation sectors, according to the TransformTO Net Zero by 2040 Strategy. In the future, we plan to expand the scope of “climate-related items” to include all sectors named in the TransformTO Net Zero by 2040 Strategy, the Resilience Strategy, and relevant to consumption-based emissions. Third, not all voting results of councillors are made public. Some votes are not recorded electronically (voted through physical hand raises only or have confidentiality reasons) and are therefore not reflected in the Toronto Open Data database. Finally, the website excludes climate-related items that were carried by default before City Council begins its session on held items.

If you can’t find the item on our website, there could be several reasons: 1) it may have been overlooked or is yet to be added to the website or 2) it may not have been defined as a climate-related item within the scope of this project. For more details on the scoping of items, please see the ‘About this Website’ tab near the bottom left hand corner of this site. If you think an item should be included on our Voting Records website, please email us at info@climatefast.ca with the item details and why you think it should be added to our Voting Records website. We will review it and respond as soon as possible. Alternatively, you may be able to see the voting results of the item on the Toronto Meeting Management Information System (TMMIS).

Absent votes indicate that the councillor was not in attendance to vote on the item or chose not to participate in a vote because they declared an interest under the Municipal Conflict of Interest Act.

We look at the final vote by City Council to adopt an item because that is the vote that determines whether an item is carried or not. However, it is important to note that votes at City Council may be performative and not truly reflective of the councillors’ understanding on the urgency of the Climate Crisis. Each councillor may also have different reasons for why they voted ‘yes’ or ‘no’ on an item or have a differing degree of understanding on what they are voting on. Therefore, it is not as simple as seeing the final vote to understand a councillor’s position on a topic. For a deeper insight, you may want to look at how your councillor voted on amendments within an item or how they voted on it within committee (if they are on the committee). Another solution is to talk to your councillor directly to gain a deeper understanding of their stance on an item.

Yes, you can. However, keep in mind that your own local councillor is more likely to prioritize a meeting with you (their constituent), than someone outside their ward.

Sending positive affirmations to councillors helps them understand that their constituents want strong climate action. This can encourage them to vote more favorably on climate-related issues, especially those that impact emissions. Additionally, councillors want to receive as many votes as possible during an election, so they are motivated to reflect the needs and desires of their constituents. By expressing approval for their climate actions, you remind them that taking bold steps on climate is important to the community. Ultimately, it is crucial for constituents to meet with their local councillor and hold them accountable for how they are representing their constituents’ demands.

Use our letter template generator to quickly and effectively send an email to your councillor now by going to the “What Can I do?” tab. It will only take a few minutes!

Please check out the public resource folder linked here to see the details on how this project came about. This public folder also acts as a toolkit to help those working on a similar project and shares lessons learned.