Mayor John Tory says Toronto City Hall will remain open to the public despite a disturbing incident on Thursday where a distressed woman began screaming outside the mayor’s protocol lounge, demanding to speak to him about the state of Toronto Community Housing.

The woman’s violent shrieks interrupted a news conference where Mayor Tory and Premier Kathleen Wynne were discussing Toronto transit.

The mayor, premier, and several journalists were holed up inside the conference room while security staff tried to calm the woman down.

Dramatic moments at City Hall as loud screams erupt from outside doors of Mayor's Protocol Lounge during media availability with John Tory & Kathleen Wynne @Momin680NEWS pic.twitter.com/imqdOh5brx — CityNews Toronto (@CityNews) March 1, 2018

Mayor Tory later addressed the incident, saying he didn’t want city hall to turn into a fortress closed off to the public.

“The premier and I were talking about this as we walked in the building this morning,” Tory said. “She (Wynne) was saying how refreshing it is to see people in the rotunda at city hall doing business with the city government.”

“People can come to my office and come to the offices of the councillors with the problems they have…and I think that’s a good thing about the building.”

When asked about obvious safety concerns, Tory said he was hopeful a reasonable balance could be found.

“When you’re in a job like this … I think you’d be not telling the truth if you were utterly unconcerned about it. But I’m confident that the measures that we’ve discussed and the things that we’ve done…both respect my strongest desire, and that of city council, to keep this building an open place for the people, but at the same time make sure that there are reasonable measures.”

“It comes with having a very open building,” he added. “Where people can come right to the office of their elected representatives, including the mayor, and tell us about some of the challenges they face.”