I told myself I wouldn’t write much until the investigation into my activities had concluded. The stress of the matter and the specific focus on my newsletter made me instinctively try to avoid anything that might further complicate my already delicate situation. I’m not exaggerating when I say that my very livelihood is on the line right now. The outcome of this investigation may jeopardize my home, my finances, and my overall wellbeing, so you can see why I might want to avoid stepping in anything further.

That said, the benefit of this probing inquiry is that I understand, with newfound depth and intensity, exactly what my rights are within the context of my employer’s code of conduct. Presenting opinions is fine, provided those opinions are made in one’s capacity as a citizen and are not directed toward the employer. Employees may comment generally on matters of public interest, so long as they do not purport to be speaking on behalf of the employer and do not disparage the employer themselves. So, in that respect:

Over the past few days, a “matter of public interest” has exploded in this city, conjuring up memories of “scandals” that are as old as I am. Once again, a highly coordinated and extremely well-funded campaign by right-wing aspiring councillors has made waves locally, reminding us that the nebulous grey area in our municipal elections laws can be exploited by those with enough bravado and enough money.

Home on the Rage

Kerr’s Crusade

Since the 1960’s, there’s been a segment of the urban population that is always looking for a chance to, for lack of a better phrase, “fight city hall”. The post-war haze subsiding, the professionalization of the municipal bureaucracy expanding, and a worldwide realignment of political alliances meant that increased scrutiny began to fall on humble city halls across Canada. The Spec ran a humourous column in October of 1960 - weeks before that year’s municipal election - in which a columnist and his wife attempt to persuade a local tax assessor to assign a lower value their house because, in the columnists words, “the taxes on this place are murder.” The column was entitled “Trying To Fight City Hall.”¹

The initial sparks of animosity between everyday residents and municipal institutions had, by the mid-1970’s, grown into a raging inferno. Some politicians made fighting the very municipal institutions over which they had power the entirety of their political identity. In 1975, Vince Agro, then a member of Hamilton’s Board of Control, published a book entitled “You Can Fight City Hall”. The subtitle was “An insider looks at local government for those who foot the bill”. As more and more politicians and residents began to take up arms against city halls, municipal institutions continued a steady march toward professionalization and bureaucratization, seeming to validate the concerns of those itching to fight their local government. This professionalization was in response to growing cities, increased needs, and provincial downloading that made municipalities responsible for far more than they were intended.

Newspapermen of yore were often some of the most ferocious critics of local governments, sniffing out waste and corruption and cronyism at every corner. One of the most dedicated opponents of municipal waste was Toronto Star reporter Tom Kerr. The Star reporter’s fixation on fighting city hall was so intense that much of his 2009 obituary in the paper references it. One reporter said” "Tom hated corruption, he hated the idea that people were abusing power.” Another quipped that "He never gave up asking questions and demanding answers.” An editors observed that he was “"a thorn in the side of jumped up, conceited mandarins" at City Hall.²

In June of 1990, Kerr’s focus turned to an up-and-coming Toronto City Councillor named Jack Layton. An unapologetic progressive who was on the forefront of struggles for social justice and worker’s rights, Layton was widely seen as a contender for the office of Mayor of Toronto in the upcoming 1991 election.

On June 14, 1990, Kerr came out with a salacious front page piece about where Layton and his wife, then-school trustee Olivia Chow, lived. Layton and Chow believed strongly in housing cooperatives, a model of housing that gives regular people control over their homes by pooling resources and funds to guarantee affordability and ensure democratic decision-making over how their buildings are run. Many housing cooperatives were funded by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) to both address affordability concerns in large urban centres and prevent the concentration of people with low incomes in “slum-like” areas. Kerr himself acknowledges this well into the article, with two lines that read: “There is nothing illegal about high-income families living in co-ops. Indeed, the legislation setting up co-ops was specifically aimed at getting a mix of incomes to avoid the development of slums, where everyone is at the same low level of income.”

That’s the point of co-ops. People pay in on a sliding scale dependent on their income and their family situation, as well as do volunteer work around the coop to ensure it is well-maintained. Everyone pitches in, everyone has an ownership stake, no matter if you’re on social assistance or a highly-paid neurosurgeon. Coops aren’t like social housing; they exist to bring people from many backgrounds together in a democratic, fair, optimistic community.

The rest of the article is a mix of out-and-out assault on Layton, the coop in which he lived, and the idea of coop housing altogether. It reveals details about Layton’s income (including some creative math on Kerr’s part, doing back-of-the-napkin calculations about what Layton’s income “actually” was based on his tax bracket and city hall salary), his custody agreement with his ex-wife, the rooms in his unit, and close to his exact address in the Hazelburn Co-Op at 178 Jarvis Street. It slammed the coop for not opening their books to the reporter and not disclosing the incomes and family compositions of private citizens residing in the building. It made the case that, once the coop’s mortgage had been paid back to the CMHC, and “after the taxpayer has poured something like $15 million into the venture, Layton and all the others living in the co-op at the time will be able to sell off the building if they want and walk away with the money,” (Hazelburn remains a coop to this day). Peppered throughout the article were references to how many Torontonians were on the affordable housing waitlist, contrasting this with how Layton “has been vocal in his support of social housing”. The article appears to purposefully muddy the public understanding of coops, all to score a political win.

The article ran under the headline: “Well-to-do Layton lives in ‘affordable’ co-op”.³

Over the following weeks, the scrutiny only intensified. Parkdale councillor Tony O'Donohue demanded a formal city inquiry into Layton’s living situation. Then-acting mayor Tom Jakobek (Mayor Art Eggleton was overseas at the time) quickly ordered city staff to launch a legal investigation into Layton and Chow, which involved the Toronto Police. Progressive Conservative MPPs called for Layton to move or resign and other NDPers living in coops were “exposed”. Federal Conservatives quickly opened an investigation into coop housing in Canada, which was followed in short order by a provincial inquiry.⁴

The circus around Layton grew and grew, with angry letter writers on both sides filling the Star’s Letters to the Editor section with their perspectives. Shortly after the inquiries were launched, the coop was targeted by a gang of protesters, enraged by Kerr’s continued reporting about purported taxpayer subsidies to an experimental housing community. The mob hurled abuse at Layton, his children, and other residents. On the steps of the coop, with the protesters chanting in the background, Layton told Star reporters that he would be moving out of Hazelburn once he could find a new home.⁵

A month after the controversy erupted, with Layton and Chow living in a rented home in Chinatown, both the Toronto Police and the Toronto City Solicitor cleared Layton and Chow of all wrongdoing. Coops were intended to be more democratic, egalitarian communities, populated by people of varying income levels and backgrounds. With his dogged reporting, Kerr forced Layton and Chow from their homes, upending their family lives and painting a target on all housing coops across Canada.⁶

Even though they were cleared of wrongdoing, the perception that Layton and Chow were somehow “cheating the system” persisted. Indeed, to this day, there are still factually-deficient accounts on social media that bring up this story whenever a politician’s housing situation is raised (a 2014 candidate for Dundas councillor here in Hamilton did just that mere days ago). The right-wing tabloid, the Toronto Sun, attempted to revive the story during Chow’s mayoral run in 2014, misleadingly running the claim that the controversy was “true”.

Shortly after, former Mayor John Sewell revealed that it was Tony O’Donohue and Thomas Jakobek, the councillors who initiated the inquiries into Layton, who leaked the story to Kerr. Globe and Mail columnist Loren Lind wrote that Layton had become “a sitting duck for a ploy by councillors [Tony] O'Donohue and Thomas Jakobek to expose him.”⁷

Kerr had been fed a story by Layton’s council opponents, who then used the story’s publication as justification to launch inquiries into him, forcing Layton to move out of his home and damaging his reputation just a year before his anticipated run for Mayor of Toronto. Rather than be a “fight against city hall”, Kerr’s reporting appeared to be a crusade against an outspoken member of city council that drew no distinction between his public service and his private life. And the words he wrote followed Layton around for the rest of his life, influencing how many saw the politician who attempted to live his values. Layton’s exoneration did not matter; the damage done by Kerr and Layton’s council enemies was done.

Hamilton is Home

Now, 35 years later, a story with strikingly similar characteristics has come to Hamilton.

This time, the focus is on Ward 4 councillor Tammy Hwang.

On or before August 18 (it is hard to tell, as the original tweet has been deleted), a local activist posted on X/Twitter about Hwang’s housing status. The specifics of the post are now lost, thanks to the author’s deleting it, but it appears to have raised the fact that Hwang is currently living in a unit managed by Victoria Park Community Homes, a housing provider that offers both subsidized and market rentals across Hamilton.

UPDATE: A friend of the newsletter who screenshotted the initial tweet was kind enough to send it along. The post includes a screenshot of Hwang’s conflict of interest declaration and asks: “Does it bother you that a sitting Councillor lives in taxpayer-subsidized housing while earning $130K a year? I spoke with an elderly neighbour who’s struggling to get by. An 85-year-old shouldn’t be footing the bill for a Councillor’s housing.”

Again, the specifics around the initial post are hard to glean, as tweets from that activist’s account have a persistent habit of going missing for unknown reasons (for reference, a tweet about me made by the same account has been deleted), but Hwang responded, noting that she does rent from Victoria Park Community Homes “but I am a full market tenant where I pay market rent. I have never been a subsidized tenant.”

Ten days later, a user of the r/Hamilton Reddit community posted a photo of a letter, which they said they “received in my mailbox yesterday”. The poster clarified in a comment that the letter arrived “as a simple piece of paper” without an envelope. Another commenter who also received the letter indicated they believed it was sent via Canada Post (through what those in political circles call a “postal walk” where political material is given to Canada Post who will, for a fee, deliver it along with other flyers). Other commenters speculated that it was dropped off by the sender or volunteers. While the specifics may not seem to matter, they have some relevance, as one option involves a considerably more significant amount of money than the other.

Using Canada Post’s website, it isn’t hard to figure out that the cost to deliver a piece of mail to every residential address in Ward 4 would be over $6,500. That’s in addition to printing enough flyers to reach the over 16,000 residential addresses (another $1,200 at least, based on available printing estimates) in the ward between Ottawa Street and the Red Hill Valley.

In big, bold type up at the top, the letter announces it is from “HAYDEN LAWRENCE CONCERNED CITIZEN”. It lists a contact email as [email protected].

***

Residents might remember Hayden Lawrence as the Conservative Party of Canada’s candidate for MP in Hamilton Centre in 2025. Lawrence earned over 17,000 votes, beating out former MP Matthew Green by about 500 votes for the second place spot.

Lawrence has been politically involved for years. He was the MC for a 2018 Ontario PC leadership showcase in St. Catharines, which foreshadowed his own candidacy for the office of St. Catharines Ward 1 (Merritton) City Councillor later that year. Lawrence finished last with 123 votes.⁸

Early last year, Lawrence sought the Conservative nomination to run federally in the riding of St. Catharines. In an interview with the right-wing online outlet The Niagara Independent, Lawrence said he was “a corporate partnerships manager for Forge FC, as well as for the Hamilton Tiger-Cats.” Focusing on cost-of-living issues and the need for better care for seniors, Lawrence said: “I absolutely love my city, and have dedicated my entire adult life to helping coach young people and facilitating community care. I want to take this passion to the House of Commons and advocate for my friends and neighbours, of all ages, who are barely getting by when they should be getting ahead.” At the time, the Elections Canada donor database indicated that Lawrence lived in downtown St. Catharines.⁹

The nomination eventually went to businessman Bas Sluijmers, who was unable to capture the seat amidst the wave of Carneydemonium that propelled incumbent Liberal Chris Bittle back into office for a fourth term. Lawrence was, instead, named Conservative candidate in Hamilton Centre. Like most Conservative candidates, he barely interacted with the media, skipping things like the Cable 14 debate to focus instead on a big money campaign that prioritized signs and advertisements.

***

The letter begins with a rather strange sentence. “It’s come to light that your Ward 4 City Councillor, Tammy Hwang, has declared a conflict of interest during a fall 2024 committee meeting regarding Victoria Park Community Housing.”

I have not been able to find this meeting anywhere in the city’s records. The letter does not clarify which committee meeting, the date, or any of the specifics. UPDATE: I’ve since been able to find the referenced meeting with the help of some friends of the newsletter. It is in reference to the September 18, 2024 General Issues Committee meeting, specifically relating to the fourth item referred to council: “Service Manager Consent for Victoria Park Community Homes Inc. (HSC24035) (Wards 5,6,7,14 and 15) (Item 10.1)” as well as delegations and discussions surrounding the motion. The motion - to allow a service manager with the city’s Healthy and Safe Communities division to authorize a mortgage for some Victoria Park Community Homes properties so they can qualify for a CMHC grant to conduct necessary capital repairs on their buildings - was only necessary because, as per the city report on the matter, “Service Manager consent is required to encumber housing projects transferred as social housing by the Province to municipalities.” The whole reason this was necessary was because the provincial government downloaded responsibilities for housing to municipalities, causing some of the mess we’re in now. Anyway, Hwang’s voluntary declaration of a conflict of interest is published on the City of Hamilton’s public Conflict of Interest Registry.

Regardless, the letter references a public declaration made by the councillor last year. It is curious as to why now, nearly a full calendar year later, it is being raised. The matter of it “coming to light” is hard to separate from the initial tweet regarding Hwang’s housing situation, as there has been absolutely nothing in local media about where Hwang lives. The only thing close to a reference to it on X/Twitter before the initial August 18 post is a post from a fringe troll account (that has 9 followers and an erratic posting style that is difficult to follow, at best) in February of this year that falsely claims Hwang lived in a CityHousing Hamilton unit.

The letter continues in much the same way Kerr’s reporting did. It references Hwang’s salary as a councillor, claims that she has “taken away a spot from someone who is in need of affordable housing,” and throws out info about what Hwang may pay in rent.

“In a time where Hamilton is visibly under duress, I find it completely unacceptable [emphasis his] for the highest paid Councillor, Tammy Hwang, to put her own self interests above the needs of the community,” the letter concludes.

It’s a short letter, but one intended to get residents angry. People are struggling, so referencing Hwang’s salary in comparison to what Lawrence assumes she pays in rent is in service of making it seem like Hwang is somehow only in it for herself. Lawrence says as much when he makes multiple references to Hwang’s living situation as being in “her own self interests”.

***

Later that day, Hwang put out her own statement on social media.

Hwang’s letter calls out Lawrence’s for implying she was occupying a subsidized unit when she, in fact, pays Victoria Park Community Homes’ market rent. She notes that her income is because she serves on 49 committees, 5 arms-length bodies, and as an Association of Municipalities of Ontario board member.

Importantly, Hwang says what many who read the letter must have been thinking: “The letter leads me to believe that the author, Hayden Lawrence, wants to get involved politically in Hamilton…As he’s now a political staffer, I can understand the interest in serving the residents of Ward 4.” The latter point is in reference to Lawrence’s now serving as Hamilton East-Stoney Creek Conservative MP Ned Kuruc’s Stakeholder Relations and Outreach Advisor.

Lawrence’s letter does strongly suggest that he intends to run for Ward 4 councillor against Hwang next year. While he positions himself as a “concerned citizen”, few other citizens of concern - certainly not the people he says are struggling under the current cost-of-living crisis - have the resources to print flyers and have them delivered to many residents in Ward 4, publicly discussing the living situation of their city councillor (though this is reminiscent of other “Concerned Hamiltonians” who had a seemingly endless supply of money and a desire to saddle the current council with blame for every ill in our society).

The letter, and the subsequent social media chatter around it has raised a lot of upsetting points. Other activists have gone wider with their critiques of Hwang, noting that she presently does not live in Ward 4 (she grew up in the ward, her parents live in the ward, and she owns the home in which they live, which she notes in her own response). Small accounts on X/Twitter (again, the overwhelming majority of the activity on that site is driven by bots, so there is no guarantee any of the people posting about this are real) accuse Hwang of “scamming” the system. A portion of the initial post went wide on some local Facebook groups, though the comments were mixed, with some people pointing out that Victoria Park Community Homes has market-rate units while others used the opportunity to blame it all on “that mayor horvath”, whomever that is.

But, ultimately, the letter seems to have not had the enraging impact Lawrence and other right-wing activists thought it would. The response on the r/Hamilton subreddit to Lawrence and the letter has been overwhelmingly negative. Comments include lines like “Hayden should be embarrassed”, “Lawrence definitely underestimated Hwang here”, and how Hwang’s response was “a much more measured and mature response than Lawrence deserved.” While the original posts on X/Twitter referencing Hwang’s housing situation have been deleted, her responses on Bluesky have elicited notable support (particularly for a social media site not known for robust engagement), indicating the community may see Lawrence’s letter for what it is: just another political game by an aspiring city councillor.

***

There are a few issues with this letter that need to be addressed.

The first is Hwang’s living situation itself. Hwang pays market rent in a housing community that is focused on providing units to people of diverse income levels. Were Hwang to have not moved into that unit, another member of the community would be paying market rent to live there. Hwang, or whomever were to occupy that unit, would not be, as Lawrence’s letter states, taking away “a unit that could otherwise shelter a senior on a fixed income or a family struggling to stay afloat”. Just the same as how you, living in your home, are not “taking that unit away” from somebody else. We all need a place to live, no matter whether we’re part of a family struggling to stay afloat or a member of city council. We should be pouring money into affordable housing - especially housing coops - but we aren’t. It was Conservative governments who pulled back from building affordable housing and it was Conservative governments that failed to invest in housing when they had the chance over the past 40 years.

It is a distraction tactic of the highest order to personalize this issue, focusing on one city councillor, when the party for which Lawrence ran has one of the worst records on providing affordable housing in recent Canadian history. The assumption is that people will be so ignorant of history and so fixated on the personal element of this scandal that they won’t stop to ask “hey, wait, shouldn’t everyone’s rent be lower?”

The hope is that this campaign won’t bully Hwang into moving, which can be a deeply disruptive and challenging thing to do, particularly while doing the amount of work Hwang does. Serving on as many committees and arms-length bodies as she does is evidence of her commitment, so needing to change living situations simply because of a campaign by political opponents to besmirch her reputation would be upsetting, to say the least. It worked after Kerr’s crusade against Layton; hopefully the same won’t happen here.

The second is Lawrence’s part in this affair. It isn’t a bad thing to want to run for public office. Many Hamiltonians sign up to do just that every election. What is concerning (putting a lot of weight on that word) is that Lawrence seems to be well-funded enough to spend a considerable amount of time and money delivering a political attack ad to the residents of Ward 4 over a year before the 2026 municipal election.

Lawrence is operating in the grey area that exists in our municipal elections laws. When someone isn’t officially a candidate, they can spend whatever they want on municipal political messages. That’s why the shadowy dark money group “Concerned Hamiltonians” was able to spend over $60,000 on print ads in The Spec in 2023 and 2024. This letter suggests Lawrence will be a candidate for Ward 4 councillor in 2026, meaning that this letter serves to both get his name out there and set the agenda before nominations even open.

There’s some level of irony in Lawrence so intently focusing on the affordability crisis through expensive political advertisements sent directly to residents of Ward 4. That irony continues when you contrast how Lawrence, in his letter, said “we must demand higher standards from our leadership” while knowing that he can spend with impunity because there’s no law governing what a prospective candidate can do before an election.

And there’s the question of political coordination. This all seems to have kicked off with social media posts, followed quickly by Lawrence’s letter, all supported by the usual accounts on social media. The messaging was similar among accounts and posts. The focus was intense and targeted. The whole thing gives the impression of a being the work of a highly-organized group of political actors keen to influence the 2026 municipal election.

Indeed, we seem to be looking at the work of a well-funded right-wing slate with ties to the local Conservative Party establishment and identifiable political figures in the community. The level of coordination between seemingly distinct accounts and the amount of money that this endeavour cost gives the impression that there is more organization happening behind the scenes than anyone is willing to publicly admit.

The activity of these aspiring politicians is often couched in deliberately obfuscating language. They’re not well-funded politicos; they’re just “concerned citizens”. They’re not actively organizing council campaigns; they’re everyday “engaged residents”. They’re not actively working to influence our politics; they’re “fed-up parents, homeowners, and taxpayers”.

Going after Hwang’s living situation was a very poor decision. Judging by the response online, the move was seen as more cynical political gamesmanship. It was designed to enrage people, but did so without offering anything of substance or any ideas on how Lawrence would actually make Ward 4 better. It was a personal attack that, in its focus on specifics about Hwang’s life, came across as mudslinging.

While this letter may have been intended to be Lawrence’s introduction to Ward 4 voters as a candidate for council, it seems to have missed the mark by a longshot. And you know what they say about first impressions…

1  _{Eric Nicol. “Trying To Fight City Hall” Hamilton Spectator, October 22, 1960 (Spec archive link).}

2  _{Nicolaas van Rijn. “'He was the consummate reporter'; Veteran newsman kept politicians on toes and earned reputation as developers' scourge” Toronto Star, November 3, 2009. Proquest Archive.}

3  _{Tom Kerr. “Well-to-do Layton lives in ‘affordable’ co-op” Toronto Star, June 14, 1990. Proquest Archive.}

4  _{"" “Layton's home in co-op faces probe by city” Toronto Star, June 15, 1990. Proquest Archive; "" “Province-wide inquiry urged into co-ops” Toronto Star, June 16, 1990. Proquest Archive.}

5  _{Andrew Duffy. “Layton says he's moving from co-op” Toronto Star, June 24, 1990. Proquest Archive.}

6  _{Margaret Polanyi. “Layton cleared of wrongdoing - Police say councillor committed no impropriety by living in co-op” Globe and Mail, August 17, 1990. Proquest Archive.}

7  _{Morris Wolfe. “Sensational tabloids are enticing a suspicious public” Globe and Mail, February 4, 1992. Proquest Archive.}

8  _{Melinda Cheevers and Steve Henschel. “Ontario Progressive Conservative Party leader hopefuls visit Niagara” Niagara This Week, February 15, 2018 (Link); City of St. Catharines Certificate of Election Results (Link).}

9  _{Nick Redekop “Conservatives nominating local candidates ahead of next federal election” The Niagara Independent [right-wing online publication], March 8, 2024 (Link); Elections Canada Donor Database (Link).}