Black Creek cuts right through York South-Weston, making it one of Toronto's most flood-prone areas. Decades of inaction from City Council has created an existential threat to both homeowners and basement tenants in our community.
We felt the worst of this crisis during the historic July 2013 storm event, and more recently from the floods in 2018 and 2023. Instead of taking immediate action to alleviate flooding risk in the ward, our City Councillor supported selling off public land in the floodplain that was earmarked for flood mitigation, and has distributed less than 3% of the Rockcliffe No-Fault Grant program's $2-million annual budget.
Today, local families still face a double threat during heavy rainfall: overland flooding from Black Creek Ravine and sanitary sewer backups when the city's infrastructure fails. As a volunteer, Chiara has already been actively mobilizing our community to protect our homes, and as your City Councillor, she will take this fight directly to City Hall.
Immediate Action on Flooding
We can’t wait another decade for the major infrastructure we need to get built because the next major flood will happen sooner rather than later. Here’s what Chiara wants to do immediately to protect our homes and keep our community safe right now:
1. Legalize new basement flooding protections and make them affordable
Today, most homeowners in the floodplain have installed backwater valves and sump pumps to protect their homes. These measures are important, but no longer adequate to protect our homes on their own because of where they are located in the floodplain.
The good news is that there is a relatively simple home renovation that homeowners can make to their plumbing system to significantly reduce the risk of sewage back-up in their basement: sewage ejection pumps.
The problem is that homeowners are not allowed to install them under the current Ontario Building Code. Chiara wants to update the Building Code to permit their use in homes located in the flood plain and expand the city’s Basement Flooding Protection Subsidy Program to include sewage ejection pumps, along with backup generators to keep essential pumps running during heavy-storm power outages, and water alarms to give residents early warning before a flood occurs.
2. Keep the canal and sewage system clean and free from debris
Even the best infrastructure in the world won’t work if it’s blocked. Debris in the Black Creek Canal and garbage in our sewage system can increase the risk and intensity of flooding by clogging pipes and waterways. We have to immediately clear up the Black Creek Canal and implement regular maintenance in city-owned infrastructure in order to ensure these systems can clear water quickly and efficiently when we need them most.
3. Get our Community Flood-Ready
We can’t control the rain, but we can control how prepared we are for the next flood. Chiara wants to create a community-based emergency response plan for Rockcliffe-Smythe that leaves no one behind, so we’re not caught off guard during the next major flood. This will include an emergency alert system straight to people’s cellphones when a major flood is imminent; annual community events to ensure our homes are flood-ready and an annual community emergency drill for anyone who would like to participate.
Long-Term Action on Flooding
Major infrastructure upgrades are needed to protect our community from flooding in the long term, and we need to make sure we get these projects right. The City of Toronto is pursuing a $323-million mitigation project aimed at widening part of the Black Creek Canal. However, world-renowned engineers and the Black Creek Flood Coalition have raised serious concerns about the project, arguing that it won’t actually remove homes in Rockcliffe Smythe from the flood plain.
Here’s Chiara’s long-term plan for flooding mitigation in York South-Weston:
1. Peer-review the design of Black Creek Canal Project
Engineers have presented evidence that the current design of the Black Creek Flooding Mitigation Project will not alleviate the risk of flooding for homes on Humber Boulevard, Cordella Avenue and Cliff Street, among others. We need to review the design of the project immediately in order to ensure hundreds of millions of dollars of public funding goes toward a solution that actually works.
2. Immediate Upgrades to Rockcliffe Smythe Combined Sewer System
Unfortunately, most of our community uses a combined sewer system: water from the sky and our toilets all go into the same pipes. This means that when it rains a lot, our sewage system gets overwhelmed and can back up into our basements – not just with rain water, but with sewage too. The current upgrades to Rockcliffe-Smythe Sanitary Storm Sewer System are scheduled to happen after the Black Creek Canal project, which means they won’t start for at least another decade, but there’s no reason why the most flood-prone neighbourhood in Toronto shouldn’t get their sewers upgraded right away.
3. Ban new development in the flood plain
After the sale of public land in the worst part of our flood plain in 2018, there are now efforts to develop that land into housing. Just across from this site, two men almost lost their lives when their elevator began to flood. This kind of development driven by back-room deals and profit rather than community wellbeing is reckless and will put more lives at risk. Chiara wants to review the special policy area currently in place for Rockcliffe-Smythe to ban new development in the flood plain and ensure the vacant land we have remains permeable parkland as a natural flood mitigation strategy.
Our community has been left out in the rain for too long. It’s time for change!