INCUMBENT RUNNING

Ward 11

Central-south London — Old South · Wortley Village · Southcrest · Berkshire Village · Manor Park · The Coves (outgoing footprint; new boundaries amended, unverified)

Researched July 2, 2026 · updated July 3, 2026 · 2 candidates registered

Your ward at a glance

Ward 11 is a two-candidate race: first-term incumbent Skylar Franke against Harinder Kumar ("Harry"), about whom very little public information could be found. The race centres on Franke's record as London Transit Commission chair and mover of tenant-protection and winter-response motions, in a ward where Old South's heritage rules collide with the city's push for more housing. Council also amended this ward's boundary; what changed couldn't be confirmed — check the city's ward map.

What Ward 11 is wrestling with

Honestly told: the situation, the numbers, and what to ask the people who want your vote.

□ SHARED — CITY + PROVINCE

Protecting tenants when buildings get redeveloped

Tenants can lose their homes when a building is torn down, converted or redeveloped, and that has become a council flashpoint: the incumbent moved an April 2026 motion directing staff to develop protections for those tenants, and voted against a 30-unit renovation plan in November 2024 that would have displaced 15 basement-unit tenants (that motion lost).

Ask your candidates

Name one protection for tenants displaced by redevelopment that council itself could pass.

■ CITY DECIDES

Old houses vs. new housing in Wortley

The Wortley Village–Old South Heritage Conservation District (designated 2015) limits redevelopment to protect the area's 1850–1930-era character, while the city pushes for more housing at the same time. A live example: a January 2026 Planning and Environment Committee staff report recommended flexibility to allow added housing at 10 Marley Place, one of the district's few larger parcels, despite the district's guidelines.

Ask your candidates

When heritage-district guidelines and new housing collide, how should council decide which gives way?

■ CITY DECIDES

Flooding in older neighbourhoods

How to handle flooding and stormwater in the ward's older neighbourhoods is contested: the incumbent has publicly opposed requiring homeowners to disconnect weeping tiles, on climate and cost grounds, favouring green-infrastructure alternatives instead.

Ask your candidates

Should the city require weeping-tile disconnections or fund green-infrastructure alternatives, and who pays?

□ SHARED — CITY + PROVINCE

Homelessness and winter warming centres

How fast emergency warming centres open has been contested at council: a February 2026 co-moved motion set the trigger at -15°C with service-provider discretion at -5°C, after advocacy for faster openings during a -30°C cold snap in January 2025.

The honest numbers ▾

February 2026 motion: warming centres triggered at -15°C, with service-provider discretion to open at -5°C.

Ask your candidates

Is the -15°C warming-centre trigger right, and if not, what number would you set?

■ CITY DECIDES

How much bus service to fund

The ward's councillor chairs the London Transit Commission. The 2024 multi-year budget added transit service hours, and further expansion from LTC reserves followed in 2025, but service levels remain a live budget question.

The honest numbers ▾

The 2024 budget added roughly 18,000 transit service hours over four years; a further 2,000 hours were moved in 2025, funded from LTC reserves.

Ask your candidates

How much more bus service should London buy in the next budget, and how would you pay for it?

■ CITY DECIDES

Thames Park and Thames Pool

Thames Park revitalization (splash pad, pickleball courts) and advocacy to reopen Thames Pool come up again and again in the ward.

Ask your candidates

What comes next for Thames Park and Thames Pool, and by what date?

Who’s running

Listed alphabetically. Identical treatment for every candidate — that’s the deal.

FRANKE KUMAR

Skylar Franke

First-term incumbent Ward 11 councillor (elected 2022), London Transit Commission chair and Federation of Canadian Municipalities board member, who previously led the London Environmental Network as executive director.

RECORD · 2022–2026 →

SPECIFICITY1 concrete proposal · 3 aspirational themes

PLATFORM, RECORD & CONTACT▾

Platform — WHAT THEY SAY

Expanded transit service: "pushing for increased service and new routes, frequency and connections, today and as the city grows" — one of four named second-term priorities. — builds on her role as London Transit Commission chair; no service-hour or dollar targets stated Campaign site ↗
Supporting affordable housing: "backing the projects, partners, and zoning changes that bring real, attainable homes to our neighbourhoods."
Planning winter homelessness support earlier: "No more last-minute scrambles in November. People deserve a plan, on paper, by summer" — a checkable timing commitment for winter-response planning. — the one timed, verifiable commitment on the site; builds on her warming-centre threshold motion and cold-snap advocacy
Advancing infrastructure projects: "roads, underpasses, parks, and community spaces — we are a growing city and we need infrastructure that meets our current needs."

Record — WHAT THEY DID

How they voted — the landmark-vote scorecard →

NOTES

Record claims on her campaign site (traffic-safety improvements, park upgrades, "historic investments" in infrastructure, libraries, transit and public safety) are candidate-stated and were not all independently confirmed by a third party in this research pass.

Her 2026 platform emphasizes track record over forward-looking numeric commitments; no second-term dollar-figure or unit-count targets were found — the clearest timed commitment is winter-homelessness planning "on paper, by summer."

Tenant protection does not appear among the four priorities on her campaign homepage as fetched July 3, 2026; her tenant-protection record (April 2026 motion) is documented separately in the compare table.

Our questionnaire QUESTIONS GOING OUT

Identical questions go to every declared candidate. Answers are published verbatim; “no response” is reported plainly.

WEBSITE ↗FACEBOOK ↗COUNCIL PROFILE ↗

Harinder Kumar "Harry"

Registered candidate for Ward 11 on the City of London's June 30, 2026 candidate list; no biography, occupation or platform could be located in this research.

SPECIFICITYNo platform published yet — checked July 3, 2026

PLATFORM, RECORD & CONTACT▾

NOTES

His campaign and social presence uses the name "Harinder Bhatia": the City of London's official List of Candidates lists www.facebook.com/harinderbhatiacanada as his campaign website (confirmed July 3, 2026), which establishes the Kumar/Bhatia link via the City's own record. City of London — List of Candidates ↗

No occupation, prior-candidacy record or policy platform was locatable under either name (re-searched July 3, 2026); the Facebook page still could not be fetched — Facebook serves a CAPTCHA/login wall to automated tools.

No prior candidacy in London municipal, provincial or federal elections was found under either name.

Our questionnaire QUESTIONS GOING OUT

Identical questions go to every declared candidate. Answers are published verbatim; “no response” is reported plainly.

EMAIL PHONE FACEBOOK ↗

Compare side-by-side ▾

	FRANKE	KUMAR
PLATFORM	Four named priorities: expanded transit service, affordable housing, earlier winter-homelessness planning ("a plan, on paper, by summer"), and infrastructure — framed as continuing first-term work	No platform published
TENANT PROTECTION	Moved April 2026 motion for protections for tenants facing demolition/conversion/redevelopment; voted against a Nov 2024 plan displacing 15 basement tenants (lost)	No position published
EXPERIENCE	First-term councillor; London Transit Commission chair; FCM national board; former London Environmental Network executive director	No prior public office or campaign presence found

Same rows for every candidate. “No position published” is information too.

The race

This is a two-candidate contest: an incumbent with a substantial, well-documented four-year record (committee chair, a national FCM board seat, and prior professional leadership of a local environmental nonprofit) against a challenger with no located public platform, prior office-holding record, or media coverage as of the research date.

Nomination filing remains open until the Clerk's certification deadline (before August 24, 2026), so the two-candidate field could still grow. Ward 11 was one of only four wards council adjusted beyond the base population-balance option, along with Wards 1, 4 and 13. Some voters may be uncertain which ward they will vote in; that wrinkle is specific to these four wards, not citywide.

Before you go

The rest is showing up

You’ve read the ward. Ward races here can come down to a few hundred ballots, sometimes fewer. In a race that close, your vote is one of the ones that decides it. You don’t need to know everything. You just need to show up, informed.

How to vote in Ward 11

ADVANCE

Oct 1

ADVANCE

Oct 3

ADVANCE

Oct 5–10

ELECTION DAY

Oct 26 · 10 am – 8 pm

You’ll need ID with your name and address. Full voting guide — where, what to bring, who can vote →

WHAT WE COULDN’T CONFIRM YET ▾

Ward 11's specific boundary amendment is unverified: it was confirmed as one of four wards council amended beyond the base recommendation (Dec 17, 2024), but not what the amendment actually changed. Consult the City's Ward Boundary Review final report or interactive ward map to describe the new footprint accurately.
The old Ward 11 community list (Old South, Wortley Village, Southcrest, Berkshire Village, Manor Park, The Coves) is sourced only to Franke's own campaign bio describing the current ward; cross-check against the new-boundary map before treating it as the ward going forward.
A claim from the research brief about a "vacant-buildings enforcement push with Lehman/Stevenson" could not be verified and is excluded here; the only related finding was a July 2023 informal walking tour of empty downtown buildings Franke did with councillors Trosow and Ferreira, unrelated to enforcement policy.
Harinder Kumar's background, occupation and platform remain unverified; the Kumar/Bhatia name relationship is now confirmed via the City's official List of Candidates (which lists the Bhatia Facebook page as his campaign website), but the Facebook page itself cannot be read by automated tools. Direct outreach or later campaign material is needed before publishing anything beyond contact information.
Franke's campaign site was fetched in full on July 3, 2026; her four named priorities are quoted from it. No numeric second-term targets were found on the site.
Candidate list reflects the City's official List of Candidates as re-checked July 3, 2026 (still a two-candidate field); nominations remained open at research time (certification before Aug 24, 2026).
Some cautions and honest-numbers claims on this page are not yet tied to a linked primary source; they are pending primary-link verification before final publish.