She has also been a proponent of a national urban agenda by calling for an expanded role of the federal government in supporting Canadian cities.

[clarification needed] It was also reported by the City Hall Bureau Chief for the Toronto Star that Keesmaat "put her hand over a CP24 camera and walked away from an interview when asked about tensions".

[33] In March 2017, she was quoted in a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation article discussing threats to the Greenbelt by developers claiming to need additional land to build housing.

Oakville Mayor Rob Burton made the following comment "we've given them serviced land they're sitting on" and Keesmaat was quoted as saying that "builders control supply in this region.

"[34] In late August 2017, Keesmaat announced that she was leaving her role with the City after public disagreements with Mayor John Tory on several policies, including the debate about tearing down the aging and costly Gardiner Expressway.

[38] The group is "dedicated to building affordable, purpose-built rental housing [particularly in Toronto and Vancouver] at a scale that’s really never been done before in the Canadian context", she told TVOntario in early April 2018.

On July 27, 2018, Keesmaat announced her intention to run for Mayor of Toronto in the 2018 municipal elections,[10] focusing much of her campaign on key priorities including transit, traffic, housing affordability, and road safety.

[42] A number of prominent local and international figures and organizations endorsed Keesmaat for mayor, including Olivia Chow, a former city councillor and Member of Parliament,[43] Toronto city councillors Kristyn Wong-Tam, Joe Cressy, Mike Layton, and Josh Matlow, noted urbanists including former Vancouver Chief Planner Brent Toderian and renowned urban planner Gil Peñalosa, and the Elementary Teachers of Toronto (ETT), which represents 11,000 teachers in Toronto’s public elementary schools.

[49] Keesmaat promised to tear down the eastern section of the aging and decaying Gardiner Expressway and replace it with a ground level boulevard,[50] pointing out that cities all over North America are choosing to tear down urban expressways rather than spending hundreds of millions of dollars on maintaining outdated infrastructure.

Keesmaat said the move would save the city roughly $500 million as opposed to re-building the decaying urban expressway, and that the decision would unlock "New communities with new jobs in retail and employment and affordable housing — places for people to live — by unlocking this land...This is really about creating a livable city.

[51] Keesmaat proposed a property tax increase on the sale of luxury homes to help pay for building 100,000 units of affordable housing.

[1] She is married to Tom Freeman, who runs FH Hospitality, a Toronto-based sales firm that supplies fixtures and furniture to hotels.