Transforming 1500 Birchmount: From Industrial Building to Sustainable Commercial Hub

TAS acquired 1500 Birchmount in October 2024 through a receivership sale, marking a pivotal step in our commitment to creating impact-driven developments. The acquisition process spanned nearly a year and involved meticulous due diligence—assessing building systems, conducting revenue and operating expense analyses, and crafting a viable capital plan to modernize the property. These efforts enabled us to secure strategic financing to support the revitalization project.

Located on 21 acres in Scarborough, this 290,000-square-foot urban industrial building has a rich history. Constructed in 1958, it once housed Laura Secord Chocolates and has since evolved to include a private school and a telecom training center. Now, we are reimagining 1500 Birchmount as a vibrant, sustainable commercial and industrial hub—a welcoming space for work and community connection.

A Vision for Sustainability and Renewal

1500 Birchmount’s transformation centers on sustainability, functionality, and inclusivity. Guided by our commitment to environmental stewardship, we are pursuing LEED O+M and CaGBC Net Zero Performance Certification. Planned renovations include:

  • Energy Efficiency Upgrades: Roof repairs, building envelope improvements, and the modernization of mechanical, electrical, and plumbing systems.
  • Material Reuse and Green Initiatives: Incorporating repurposed materials and introducing sustainable practices throughout the building.
  • Enhanced Accessibility: Upgrading infrastructure to ensure the building is welcoming and functional for all users.

Leasing with Purpose

Our leasing strategy prioritizes impact. A portion of the building will be allocated to social enterprises and not-for-profits at below-market rates, enabling these organizations. Outdoor Communal areas are being designed to foster collaboration and community engagement. Situated on the Birchmount bus line and near residential areas, the building offers convenient access to commercial and industrial opportunities.

Anchored in Continuity and Inclusivity

The building’s existing anchor tenants—an international school and a telecom training center—will remain on-site during the transformation, ensuring stability and continuity for their clients and communities. As the project progresses, we aim to attract a dynamic mix of tenants who share our vision of sustainability and community connection.

Be Part of the Transformation

1500 Birchmount is more than a building; it’s a space designed to inspire collaboration, innovation, and environmental responsibility. If you’re interested in leasing a space, contact Ashley Burke, VP of Asset Management, at ashley.burke@tasimpact.ca or 416-510-8181 ext. 277.

TAS Releases 3rd Annual Impact Report

Read our 2023 Impact Report

We are thrilled to announce the release of TAS’s 3rd Annual Impact Report, a summary of the progress we made on our impact objectives in 2023.

The report summarizes the great strides we made last year toward our impact objectives. It includes an overview of TAS’s impact framework, inspiring stories, and data from the year. We are immensely proud of the dedication and hard work our team has invested into advancing the project milestones and social and environmental initiatives that are reflected in the report.

Embedding impact into business operations

A key theme of this year’s report is how TAS continues to integrate impact into our business. Today, it is embedded in our funds, corporate structure, culture, and every stage of project delivery. This focus on impact has been instrumental in helping us navigate current market challenges, build support for our projects, and drive project success.

Top 10 impact achievements  

This year’s report features a “Top 10” list, which are our favourite impact moments and achievements from 2023. From the closing of our fourth value-add development fund, to adding new affordable housing units to our pipeline in Scarborough, and launching the Circular Living Lab at 2 Tecumseth, there were many great accomplishments.

Enhanced focus on accountability, transparency, and measuring progress

In 2023, we expanded the number of impact indicators we are reporting on from 50 to 65. Additionally, we are proud to present our first Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Inventory and Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD). And for the first time, the report includes year-over-year data for several key performance indicators, providing valuable insights into our progress and areas for improvement.

Looking ahead

TAS is committed to building on our strengths and leveraging our platform to lead positive change around how the real estate industry interacts with people and the planet. We look forward to working together with our many partners and collaborators in the years to come.

We invite you to read the full impact report to learn more about our journey and the progress we have made in 2023.

For more information, please download the full report [here].

Have a question, great partnership idea or just want to keep in touch? Reach out to our impact team at impact@tasimpact.ca.

NEW: TAS’s Reconciliation Action Plan

Today, we proudly released our Reconciliation Action Plan. The Plan is intended to guide our actions as we work to integrate Indigenous knowledge, practices, and norms into the way we operate and do business.

It was crafted with the expertise of Creative Fire, a consulting agency owned by the Des Nedhe Group, the economic development arm of the English River First Nation, as well as input from staff, Indigenous leaders, and rights holders.  

The Plan is structured around six pillars, reflecting the areas that we feel we can best contribute to reconciliation:

  1. Education: Providing cultural competency training and professional development for the TAS team.
  2. Engagement: Building meaningful relationships and collaborations with Indigenous organizations and communities.
  3. Ceremony: Hosting site activations, land ceremonies, storytelling, and cultural events.
  4. Stewardship and Placekeeping: Integrating Indigenous design principles, worldviews, and languages into TAS projects.
  5. Economic Empowerment: Offering affordable housing, below-market commercial space, social procurement, and investment opportunities for Indigenous businesses and communities.
  6. Governance: Ensuring impact measurement and leadership accountability within TAS.

The living document will be iterated over time as we learn by doing and continue to understand the interests of the Indigenous People. Progress will be reported on in our annual Impact Report.

Walmer Road – Indigenous People’s Day Celebration

One of the actions in the Plan is to engage the broader community around TAS’s sites through Indigenous storytelling, workshops, cultural events, ceremonies, or other initiatives, in partnership with Indigenous organizations or community groups.

We are excited to begin delivering on this action with the Walmer Road Legacy Space Celebration, happening later this week. The annual event is hosted by TAS with our partners at the Walmer Road Baptist Church and the Gord Downie and Chanie Wenjack Fund.  It is an opportunity for neighbours and friends in the Annex and surrounding neighbourhoods to learn about and celebrate the history, heritage, resilience, and diversity of First Nations,

For generations, many Indigenous groups and communities have celebrated their culture and heritage on June 21 or around that time of year because of the significance of the summer solstice as the longest day of the year.

To learn more about the event and to RSVP please visit the event page.

B Corp Re-Certification Validates TAS’s Progress Harnessing the Power of Business for Good

TAS has been a certified B Corporation since 2013. This means we’re part of a global community of businesses that meet high standards of social and environmental impact.

We recently went through the recertification process and are proud to report that we have been recertified with an impressive score of 147.  This marks a significant leap from our 2019 score of 107.3.

In celebration of our latest recertification, we’re reflecting on what it means for TAS to be a B Corp, where we have been, and how we’re working on continuous improvement to “harness the power of business for good”.

What does it mean to be a B Corp?

B Corp Certification means that a company has been verified as meeting B Lab’s high standards for social and environmental impact.

To achieve certification, a company must:

  • Demonstrate high social and environmental performance by achieving a B Impact Assessment score of 80 or above and passing B Lab’s risk review.
  • Make a legal commitment by changing its corporate governance structure to be accountable to all stakeholders, not just shareholders.
  • Exhibit transparency by allowing information about its performance measured against B Lab’s standards to be publicly available on their B Corp profile on B Lab’s website. 

The B Corp certification process is rigorous – they don’t make it easy. The process includes an assessment of a company’s activities against a quantifiable grading system for measuring environmental performance, corporate activities, and supply chain transparency.

To maintain certification, companies must undertake the assessment and verification process every three years, demonstrating they are still meeting B Lab’s standards — which are themselves always improving, with continual input from expert stakeholders.

Why did TAS become a B Corp?

As leaders in the impact real estate space, it was important for TAS to become a B Corp business. We recognized that as a B Corp, we can build trust with communities and customers; attract and retain employees and draw mission-aligned investors.

TAS uses the B Corp assessment process to benchmark our performance and identify opportunities to improve our impact according to best practices across all five B Corp dimensions: Workers, Community, Environment, Customers and Governance.

What is a B Impact Assessment Score?

Certified B Corporations must earn at least 80 points on the B Impact Assessment. Scores are verified through a review process, which includes documentation, and phone calls.  TAS’s score has fluctuated over the years, from 128.3 in 2013 to 106.6 in 2019.

We’re proud that our 2023 score is the highest score yet at 147.  Since our last assessment, we have developed an impact framework and operationalized the framework across our business. We now have dedicated teams working on impact implementation and impact strategy and measurement.  We also developed a social procurement program to help us leverage our spending power for good.

What’s Next?

B Corp certification isn’t a destination – our mission to use real estate as a tool to create impact is a constant work in progress. We are always striving to do better, be better, and benefit more communities.

In the last year, we’ve taken some big steps towards longstanding goals, including improving our environmental purchasing program, employee practices and policies, and our commitment to the sustainability of our buildings.

Our next focus is on implementing our Indigenous Truth and Reconciliation Action Plan, and continuing our commitment to climate resilience by integrating the recommendations of IFRS S2 (formally TCFD) across our business.

To us, being a B Corp-certified company is about being part of a global community of businesses working collectively for economic systems change. We know that we must stay committed to this work, move with the world and adapt to meet new needs in order to keep our place in a community of B Corps moving business forward.

TAS Announces Final Closing of Fourth Value-add Development Fund

[Toronto, January 8, 2024]

Today TAS announces the final closing of its fourth value-add development real-estate fund, TAS Impact Development LP 4 (“TAS LP4”).  Having raised a total of $123 million in equity commitments for this closed-end fund, this represents TAS’s largest fund to date.

TAS LP4 will be primarily focused on developing and repositioning multi-family and urban industrial assets to deliver long-term financial performance for investors, while generating a measurable social and environmental impact.  A commitment to achieving set impact goals and on-going progress measurement is built into the fund. As a market leader in impact investing, a portion of management fees in TAS LP4 are subject to a claw back if benchmark impact targets relating to reporting, sustainability and affordability are not met.

The fund is backed by a diverse set of values-aligned investors, primarily major Canadian institutional investors as well as foundations and family offices from across Canada and Europe. 

TAS expects to acquire between 4-6 properties in TAS LP4.  The fund will be focused on the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area (GTHA) and explore opportunities in Montreal, Ottawa, and Vancouver through strategic partnerships.  Each project will target substantially-reduced embodied carbon, offset unavoidable embodied carbon and have net-zero operating carbon emissions. The fund has implemented portfolio-level risk-management guidelines for concentration, recourse and liquidity risks to reflect the volatility of today’s and future market conditions.

“We are grateful to our limited partners for their trust in TAS. Our ability as a firm to achieve a successful capital raise in today’s market is a testament to the confidence investors have in our differentiated investment strategy and our impact framework,” commented Mazyar Mortazavi, President and Chief Executive Officer of TAS.

“We are closely monitoring the market to capitalize on interesting opportunities and look forward to putting our fresh capital to work in 2024,” said Khan Tran, Chief Investment Officer, TAS.  “This is an exceptional opportunity to build a best-in-class portfolio of properties that will deliver strong returns, while also driving a broad range of impact objectives.”

For more information:
Ariana Holt
Director, Engagement
ariana.holt@tasimpact.ca 
647-354-3467