In the run-up to this month’s municipal election, the Star is profiling several key battleground races, offering intimate portraits of the candidates and the issues moving voters. In today’s spotlight, York South—Weston.
In the former municipality of York, there is a family name synonymous with politics: Nunziata.
Siblings John and Frances have won a combined 16 elections here since 1978. Together, they’ve occupied almost every possible elected office, at one time or another — school board trustee, alderman, mayor, councillor and member of parliament. But while John’s last electoral victory was in 1997, his older sister hasn’t lost or sat out a single race in her 41-year political career.
Now she is running for a ninth consecutive term on city council. There are eight people after her job, two of whom have the backing of influential advocacy groups on either side of the political spectrum.
One of these challengers, tenant advocate Chiara Padovani, was just 94 votes away from winning the last election. The other, Catholic school board chair Daniel Di Giorgio, is the son of the Nunziata siblings’ political archrival: former councillor Frank Di Giorgio, who beat John in 2014 but lost to Frances in 2018.
Across the ward, residents told the Star they struggle with the same issues any Torontonian might: high cost of living and concerns around public safety. On a more granular level, they say there is an epidemic of basement flooding, and a dearth of affordable homes and recreation programs.
The candidates all have their own solutions. Nunziata says she secured transformative programs and projects for the ward, she just needs one final term to implement them. Her main opponents say she’s had long enough. In fact, they say they believe no one should reign as long as she has again. Both say they are in favour of term limits.
“There is an appetite for change,” said voter Jae Malana, who moved to the ward in 2017 and lives there with his husband and daughter. “We’ve had the same councillor for too long. We need someone with a fresh perspective.”
Next term ‘definitely my last,’ Nunziata says
Nunziata told the Star on a walk through her neighbourhood Saturday this will be her last election, win or lose. What will private life look like for her? She can’t say. But she said if she can remain in her post long enough to see shovels in the ground on the affordable housing she helped get approved, she will ride off feeling “really proud of what I’ve been able to achieve.”
The week before this interview, rumours swirled that Nunziata was inches away from dropping out of the race. These were lies, she said Saturday, concocted by opponents “to get rid of me.”
Her and her team projected more confidence to the Star while out canvassing over the weekend. Nunziata said record-breaking advance poll numbers this election convinced her that voters will show up for her. She’s been endorsed by the same conservative advocacy group as mayoral candidate Brad Bradford, ABC Toronto.
She also said she believes she is the only candidate with the institutional knowledge to get residents what they want and need from the city. She gives the Weston Loop as an example. It’s an ambitious plan to connect and improve five parks in the ward over the next 25 years. Nunziata said she got local developers to pay for it by writing a creative motion that became the envy of council.
“I had some of the other councillors say, ‘That’s amazing, I’d like to do it in my ward as well,’” she said. “Experience makes a big difference. It takes years to gather the experience you need to get things done.”
Nunziata was often embraced walking up to the homes of her constituents last weekend. Residents told her they remember her helping them out of binds years ago. They said they trust her to assuage their latest concerns, about unkempt lawns nearby, a sinking driveway and loud neighbours. They asked after her brother, too. Is he well? He is, she replied.
“These younger people are saying I’m too old,” said Nunziata, who is 74, to a woman who looked 10 or 20 years her junior. “But you know what? Age has nothing to do with it, if you’re doing a good job.”
The woman, who answered her door with a machete and a watering can and didn’t put either one down for the entire eight-minute conversation, agreed. If something isn’t broken, she said, why fix it?
Will the third time be the charm for Padovani?
The Star joined perennial progressive challenger Chiara Padovani last week for a portion of her third lap of the ward this campaign. On previous tours, she’d scored each home’s level of support from one to four, with one indicating a guaranteed vote for her. She skips the “ones” and “fours” when she re-visits a place.
Padovani’s pitch to the undecideds is this: She is someone who is committed to the betterment of the ward, whether or not she represents it on council.
After her narrow loss in 2024, she kept her campaign office open to use as a shared space for community volunteers and advocates. Here, her York South—Weston Tenant Union organized multiple rent strikes in the ward in response to illegal rent increases and lapsed maintenance. A 16-month strike was resolved with an “amicable” private settlement in 2024. Another 10-month strike ended with the Landlord and Tenant Board ruling in the renters’ favour the same year.
“If that’s how hard I’m working when I lose an election, you know how hard I’m gonna work when I win, right?” she tells people at the door. “I’m not a politician. In my core, I’m not a politician. I’m a social worker. I am your neighbour. This is my community. I love this place.”
Why, then, is someone so averse to being thought of as a politician seeking, for the third time in a row, to become one?
“Because we’ve got to get some new representation down at city hall,” she replied. “We need change in this community. So, if I don’t win this election, I’m going to do the same thing I did last year: keep working for this community.”
Cheating accusations and legal threats
There is a bitterness between Padovani and the incumbent. Padovani made a social media post accusing the councillor’s campaign of cheating in the last election. Padovani said Nunziata threatened her with a lawsuit if she didn’t remove the post, which the challenger said she spent thousands in legal fees defending against.
“We had asked that she not continue giving false information, which was very defamatory,” said Nunziata. “I’m glad she spent some money on it. That’s good that she did. There’s no need to take the post down now, because nobody believes it, right?”
The city’s integrity commissioner found that Nunziata’s chief of staff breached council’s code of conduct last election. The staffer gathered the contact information of at least 8,000 local residents without their consent and emailed some of them asking for their vote. Councillors are prohibited from using city resources for a campaign.
Nunziata apologized after the commissioner released his report in 2024. She maintains that she had no knowledge of what her staff had done. The integrity commissioner wrote that he found no evidence to suggest otherwise.
‘Nefarious forces’ in York South—Weston
Daniel Di Giorgio does not have kind things to say about the councillor. He said he believes she prioritizes the needs of developers and more powerful politicians over those of her constituents.
“There are a lot of nefarious forces in play in York South—Weston, in my opinion,” he said in an interview Monday. To him, the “ultimate manifestation” of this is the Weston Lions Arena controversy.
City council initially wanted to let Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment (MLSE) turn the aging arena, which was in need of costly upgrades, into a recreational hub for underprivileged youth. Local families and hockey leagues revolted, starting petitions to save the arena, even successfully appealing to Premier Doug Ford for help.
This pushed the city and MLSE back to the drawing board earlier this year to work on a compromise project, with new provincial funding promised, to preserve both the arena and the new youth programs. Redesigns haven’t been released yet.
“Since that happened, there’s been numerous requests to have a public meeting,” said Di Giorgio, who faults the incumbent for this. “It hasn’t happened. That lack of respect for the community is pretty unique.” (Before the province got involved, Nunziata did hold town halls and public meetings with city staff about the arena.)
Di Giorgio’s disappointment with the city’s handling of the arena put him in alignment with IntegrityTO, a municipal advocacy group that fought for the preservation of the arena online and at city hall. The group, which takes progressive councillors and policies to task on social media, but has also been criticized for posting graphic videos of homeless people in distress, endorsed Di Giorgio last week.
“IntegrityTO, I really support the work they did for York South—Weston,” he said. “I appreciate them tapping me on the shoulder, being their pick in the riding.”
