Ward 12 candidate Matteo Raso joins Love the North to discuss housing affordability, homelessness, public transit, infrastructure, accessibility, downtown conditions and Greater Sudbury’s finances.
Housing is the biggest reason Raso says he entered the race.
He argues that the cost of housing has risen beyond what many residents can reasonably afford and says several other challenges facing the city flow directly from that problem. He points out that homelessness does not always mean someone is unemployed — some people are working but still cannot afford a place to live.
Raso acknowledges that mental-health care and addiction treatment depend heavily on provincial policy, but says the City can still support services within shelters and concentrate on the areas municipal government can directly influence — particularly housing.
His goal is to make it easier for someone moving through emergency or transitional housing to eventually find a permanent home they can afford.
Downtown conditions are another concern.
Raso says residents should not have to walk past discarded needles and drug paraphernalia and supports increased cleanup services. At the same time, he says encampments cannot simply be treated as a cleanliness problem. Adequate shelter and a pathway into permanent housing also have to be part of the solution.
Public transit is one of his other major priorities.
Raso says Ward 12’s main bus routes can become extremely crowded and argues for more frequent service and greater capacity. He specifically questions why service frequency drops around the time many people are finishing work or beginning afternoon and evening shifts.
For him, better transit also depends on better infrastructure.
While door knocking, Raso says seniors have told him they would like to give up their vehicles and use public transit, but in some areas there are no sidewalks connecting their homes to nearby bus stops.
That means a person may live close to transit but still be unable to safely use it.
The same issue affects residents using wheelchairs or other mobility devices, who can be forced onto uneven roads because sidewalks simply do not exist. Raso describes accessibility in parts of Ward 12 as poor and says greater investment is needed.
On taxes and municipal finances, Raso takes a more measured position. He says nobody enjoys tax increases, but municipalities still have to pay for services and cannot operate entirely through borrowing. He describes Greater Sudbury’s debt position as relatively manageable while acknowledging that City spending can still be improved.
Raso also supports Greater Sudbury’s net-zero goals and discusses the potential to make greater use of methane generated at the landfill by capturing it and converting it into useful energy rather than allowing that energy value to go to waste.
Although he acknowledges being younger than many municipal candidates, Raso says he wants residents to judge him on his commitment and willingness to work for Ward 12.
His central message is that Greater Sudbury needs to concentrate on the things that directly determine whether people can afford and navigate their city: housing, transportation, sidewalks, infrastructure and basic accessibility.
#Sudbury #Ward12 #MatteoRaso #SudburyElection #HousingAffordability #PublicTransit #Accessibility #Infrastructure #Homelessness #DowntownSudbury #GreaterSudbury #NorthernOntario #LoveTheNorth
Sudbury Ward 12: Matteo Raso on Housing, Transit and Making the City More Affordable
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Transcript ~2,352 words · ~12 min read
Matteo Raso from Ward 12 is joining us here in the studio. Matteo, good to see you. Good to see you too. So, tell me, what,(...) why are you running? The biggest thing by far is the housing crisis. The past couple of years, housing in the city has gotten way too expensive. It is pricey. It is, it is. And obviously, this affects the entire country. Yeah. This is something that requires all level of government to cooperate on, but that includes municipal government as well. Yeah. There's things that the city can do to lower the price of housing in this city, so that's what I want to focus on if I get elected. Okay. So,(...) that, the housing ties into the affordability. Absolutely. Everything's just crazy expensive. Yes. A lot of issues in this city are downstream of the housing crisis, which is why I've checked my socials. Yeah. I'm constantly talking about the state housing in the city. Okay. Ward 12. I don't think anyone's come through here yet from Ward 12, so what is the area that it covers? It's a bit oddly shaped, so it covers Sudbury Secondary, the area around there. Yeah. Also covers the Donovan. Yeah. Parts of Montrose near New Sudbury, but not in New Sudbury. So, it's very downtown-ish. Does it cover the TV station, Fruit Road? Sorry? The TV station on Fruit Road? Does it cover up in that area? I don't know which TV station you're talking about. Okay. That's okay.
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So, affordability is high. How does that tie into the(...) drug usage and the homelessness? Well, homelessness is, a lot of it comes from the housing crisis, because there's a lot of people who are homeless that are working, they're employed, but they can't afford a house. So, that's definitely part of it. As for drug usage, a lot of that is mental health care, and that's a provincial policy. There's not a whole lot to see and do about that. Right. It's something that the city can do, and it's something that I would support if I'm elected. Yeah. And then we provide mental health care within homeless shelters. That's not what the city normally do, but that's something Sudbury does because it's the right thing to do. So, is Sudbury doing that now? Yes. It's not a normal thing for cities to do, but it's the right thing to do. If I'm elected, I will continue that policy. However,(...) we're somewhat restricted in that front. Yeah. There's not a whole lot we can do without the province cooperating, so. Right. I'm focused on what I can do. And what I can do is work to lower the cost of housing. And that's... I'll hope a bit, but it's not going to solve everything. Yeah. No, you know what? I think that's important. You got to focus on what you can do. Exactly. Okay.
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Moving over to the(...) city taxes and spending of the taxpayers' money. Is the city getting it right?
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I think we're doing a decent job. I'm not going to say everything's perfect, but it could definitely be a lot worse. Okay. If you look on our budget, our debt profile is pretty decent. Yeah. Like, the city says that we could raise debt, not that we should raise debt, but if we were in a position where we had to raise debt, we could do so very safely. So I'd say, you know, we're more good than bad in that front. Okay.(...) The taxes, the raises, the... So the tax increases that are happening,(...) are they justified? Like, do they make sense? I would say for the most part, yes. Yeah. Okay. Obviously nobody likes taxes going up, but(...) with the circumstances we find ourselves, we have to increase taxes for the various services, but... Yeah. I should... Stuff has to get paid for. Exactly. Okay. You can't run the city entirely off of debt, so...(...) No, you still have to bring money in from the people and get as much as you can from upstairs like the province or the feds. And the feds, yeah. Okay.
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How... What's...(...) We might be going backwards here a little bit, but how would you clean up and get the downtown maybe revitalized, get more businesses to come in and have more(...) stuff happening there? Well, basically, we need to increase janitorial services. It's unacceptable that people have to walk by dirty needles and drug paraphernalia, so that's definitely something we have to work on. Okay. Another thing also is we have to provide adequate shelter for homeless people because it's unacceptable and inhumane that we have encampments downtown, so I definitely work in on increasing transition to housing and coming back to the housing again. Yeah. I have to lower the cost of housing so that once someone's in transition to housing, they can get into permanent housing where they sustain themselves, so... Is Energy Court, you know, you know Energy Court where they have all the homeless, is that in your ward?(...) I don't believe so, no. I believe it's Ward 10. Okay, okay.
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So getting people off the streets, cleaning up the downtown,(...) would that then spur and help with new businesses, you know, coming in? I do think so, yes, it'd make it a very business-friendly environment. Okay. Is the city doing a good job right now with(...) spurring new businesses to come into... Are they doing a good job in trying to attract new businesses?(...) I think it's doing a good job, perhaps not a great job though. Like,(...) they canceled the Kingsway Entertainment District, I would have kept that if I was on the court, but... Yeah. It's the council. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But they're building the arena downtown, which I understand people are angry about, but we've already started construction, so... Yeah.(...) I think there's more we could do, but for the most part, we're not doing a terrible job. Okay.
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Moving on to...
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We're missing a few things here.
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I'm going to have to look to see what we're missing. Well, besides hosting the two main parts of my platform, are improving public transit and improving infrastructure in this city, so... Oh, okay. So tell more about the public infrastructure and the transit. I'll start with public transit. Okay. Right now, the main public transit line for Ward 12 is the one end. It's very overcrowded if you take it. It is? Oh yeah, dangerous. Because it was so bad in fact that a lot of people who try to get the new subways, like, go on the number two bus line, even though it's more convenient to take the number one, the one end. So, if I am elected, I'll make sure we have bigger buses and better services, because it is terrible on there. If you ever go on there, it's miserable. So bigger buses, I don't know if that's going to happen, but what about having more buses come... More buses too, because a lot of buses stop after 5.30, which doesn't make sense. Really? Yeah, exactly, because that's when people gain all four, because that's when they need buses the most. So, but then they go like once an hour instead of once every half an hour, so I'll make sure we have much more frequent bus services if I'm elected. Yeah, especially where it's needed, because you don't want to have... You need to move people. If you can move people, and especially people have(...) jobs that they have to do in the night, or not in the night, but at least evening,(...) afternoon shift. That sort of thing. Okay.
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Roads and infrastructure,(...) how's the city doing with that? Not good. You go around 4-12, there's a number of roads that are just terrible. The city's never done any work on there in years. And also there's no sidewalks to walk on, so I've been doing door knocking. I've had a number of seniors come to me saying that they want to give up their car, they want to... Really? Yeah, they want to take the bus, but they can't, because they have to walk on the road, there's no sidewalks. Right. So, even though they live near a bus station, they can't take public transit, so it's terrible. If I am elected, I'll make sure 4-12 gets a lot more investment in public infrastructure.
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So, the...(...) So(...) okay, you have the roads, and they may not be in the best of shape in your ward.
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And then you have the water that's happening below the roads, and I'm sure it's probably almost everywhere, because everyone needs the water, or the utilities, sewer and water.
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What would be a good way to maybe work on... So let's say we have a stretch of road that needs to be repaved.
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Should the water... should the water underneath the road also be looked at, and maybe doing the maintenance on there, doing it two at once, because you don't want to repave and then have to(...) tear it up a few years later, because the pipes need(...) servicing, need work?(...) Truthfully, I haven't looked too much at the water situation. If that's necessary, then absolutely yes, we should look at the water pipes, but I'm not sure if the water pipes need repair. Okay, yeah, fair enough.
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Accessibility, you know, getting around in the winter with the sidewalks that might be... that need to be plowed, or accessibility into the new library that's happening downtown.
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Are(...) things going in the right direction?
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Well, I wouldn't say in Ward 12, no, because as I said, there's no sidewalks to be used in the first place in many areas, so if you're in a wheelchair, you have to ride it down the bumpy road,(...) accessibility in Ward 12 is terrible. Accessibility outside Ward 12, you know, it's maybe a bit different. I would say accessibility in(...) the bus terminal downtown is okay, not great, but for the most part, I'm just looking at Ward 12, and in Ward 12, accessibility is not good. Yeah, so when you're out knocking on doors, that's what people are really focusing on? That's one of the things. A lot of it is just housing crisis, obviously, because I've talked to a lot of people who are renting, if you're renting, obviously that's going to be front of your mind.(...) Yeah, because the price of rent is really... well, it's high. Oh, it's very high. So you need to have, if you don't have one job, you need to probably have more than one. Yeah.(...) And then everything else that goes along with them.
So Mateo, is there anything else that you want to cover that we might have not(...) talked about so far?
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Net zero? I guess net zero is a good one. So what about net zero? Tell me more. Like, I see some of the(...) city vehicles are now electric. Exactly, that's part of our net zero initiatives. Trying to reduce our carbon emissions, so we've been transitioning over to electric vehicles. We also have plans to transition our electric buses, but we're still in the process of doing that, it hasn't happened yet. Okay, so all the buses are still fossil fuel? Exactly. Okay.
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That's definitely a part of becoming net zero. Even if you have diesel buses, it gets people all of their cars into buses, which definitely helps out. Another thing though is, this surprises people.(...) The city government's main source of carbon emissions is actually the city dump. Really? Yeah, because people put their biowaste over there, like their lawn clippings or whatever. They decay, it emits methane. So one of the top priorities of the city actually to become net zero is finding a way to handle the methane emissions. Something that greater server utility does that serve more of a project than the major source of electricity is that they take the electricity, I mean, they take the methane and they turn it into electricity, they use it as a fossil fuel. So that doesn't directly reduce carbon emissions, but at the very least make sure we get the most value out of our carbon emissions. So that's something I would definitely look at if I'm left, you know, scaling that up, seeing if it's a viable permanent source of electricity, if we can't find a way to reduce methane emissions. However, I would like to find a way to reduce methane emissions from the city dump. So I would definitely look and see what strategies the city is doing to handle that, what we can do differently to help with that, like what other cities have done. That's definitely something I would look at as part of our net zero initiatives. Yeah, because I think they have a program, it starts with C and I might be getting it wrong here, but it's called Covert Gen or something Gen.(...) And that's(...) a sub-ree... It's UT. It's full of the companies of C. Yeah, and that's where they work with the(...) methane(...) emitting and try to(...) transfer the energy into another form.(...) Okay.
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Wrapping up, is there anything else that you want to cover that would, you know, that you want to let your constituents know when Ward 12? Ward 12 is a...(...) it's a good ward, it's an old ward. It's a very... some of the neighbourhoods have been around for a very, very long time.
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Anything you want to say to your people as we wrap up? Yes. I know that I'm pretty young for a municipal candidate, but even though I'm young, I am very dedicated, very passionate. If I am elected, I will be there every single day for my constituents. Yeah, okay. I think you said it just best right there. You'll be there for them. Yep, exactly. Matteo,
