In one week, Toronto residents go to vote in the city’s mayoral byelection.

And since she filed her nomination papers, Olivia Chow has been the frontrunner according to all of the polls, including two new surveys out Monday morning.

Both Ipsos and Forum have Chow out in front, with 38 percent of decided voter support in the Ipsos poll, 31 percent in the Fourm poll.

Both surveys have Mark Saunders in second in the mid-teens, with Ana Bailao in third according to both.

Anthony Furey has shown steady momentum, tied with Bailao at 13 percent support in the Forum poll, further down the list in the Ipsos survey.

The growing housing affordability crisis has received a lot of attention on the campaign.

Matti Siemiatycki is a planning expert at the University of Toronto and an occasional guest on Zoomer Radio’s Fight Back with Libby Znaimer.

He says to build affordable housing, Toronto’s next mayor must be really focussed on implementation.

“Housing gets built over decades not over years and the housing supply that we have, much of it the rental, that’s now affordable rental was actually built in the 60s and 70s,” Siemiatycki explained to CP24, “We’re playing catch up here. We need to start investing seriously and invest over the long term, not just expect that in one term of council is going to address this challenge.”

Olivia Chow says she will raise Toronto’s vacant home tax from one to three percent to pay for more affordable housing.

Mark Saunders says he will take property tax off of affordable housing units in future developments.

Ana Bailao says her housing plan will be funded with proceeds from an existing city building tax levy.

Josh Matlow says his housing strategy will be funded mainly by savings from not rebuilding the elevated portion of the Gardiner Expressway east of Jarvis Street.