CITY HALL
• Nine out of 10 taxpayers agree Rob Ford is right, says Ford [The Star]
• Toronto council ridicules deputy mayor’s idea to build private toll lanes [Globe & Mail]
• Councillors talking tolls [The Sun]
• Councillor wants province to allow Toronto de-amalgamation [National Post]
• Money for nothing [The Sun]
BUDGET CUTBACKS
• City cuts would save less than $30 million [The Star]
• City economics: budget surplus=deficit [The Star]
• The cuts that never were [Globe & Mail]
• City hall considers wave of budget cuts [National Post]
• Thousands rally against proposed cuts [National Post]
• Scene: protesting budget cuts at city hall [Torontoist]
• Deficit deniers have to open their eyes [The Sun]
• Mayor Ford says he found gravy [The Sun]
• Budget blindside: councillors accuse Ford of hiding millions in city revenues… [NOW]
HOUSING & DEVELOPMENT
• TCHC scaps housing project [The Star]
• Have Toronto home sale values gone up or down? Check our interactive map [Globe & Mail]
• Crematoriums operate unnoticed across the GTA [The Star]
OTHER NEWS
• Sluggish Toronto-area commutes are hurting Ontario’s economy big time [Globe & Mail]
• Rituals: the weekend brunch [The Grid]
• Information booth: where did those ghostly white bikes come from? [National Post]
• What you may have missed at Word on the Street [Torontoist]
• The Nuit Blanche curators, in conversation [Torontoist]
4 comments
De-amalgamation being on the table is a really interesting development, but I fear that Toronto has grown far too integrated (and perhaps polarized) to return to a two-tier system of government. I understand where Councillor Fletcher is coming from – there definitely is an urban-suburban divide here, where the downtown Councillors fight for services and the suburbs seem to lean towards cuts – but is a return to a Metro Toronto system really the answer?
What would happen to the downloaded responsibilities that Mike Harris gave Toronto, like social housing? Would we fracture and shrink them down even further (exacerbating the problem of complex program administration and varying subsidy levels, which the 2007 Staff Action Report on Social Housing claims costs the city $77 million in ‘wasted’ funding [http://www.toronto.ca/legdocs/mmis/2007/cd/bgrd/backgroundfile-8980.pdf])?
Instead, I think the best option is for Toronto to start thinking like the large city it is. We need some kind of progressive taxation reflective of our size and economic power in Canada and, perhaps more importantly, we need the ability to levy taxes proportional and reflective of our responsibilities as a large City. When Mike Harris downloaded social housing to Toronto, we were promised it would not be a progressive cost – surprise surprise, we were lied to, and we ended up stuck with regressive taxes to pay for progressively more expensive programs. Clearly, this is unsustainable for Toronto – something is going to have to change, and my guess is that it will be sooner rather than later.
A small note on the first news item:
If you watch the video, what Ford actually says is that “I’m talking nine per cent–nine out of every 10 people I meet–say, ‘Rob, stay the course.’”
Based on the ceaseless pushback and complete lack of visible/audible support for the Mayor’s agenda, I’d say he got it right the first time… less than 10% of Toronto citizens think he should keep going.
In regards to Sean’s comment, I could not agree more regarding the assessment of the damage created to the city’s budget by the Harris govt’s downloading of social housing.
With respect to the comments on two-tier municipal government, I would say we need it urgently… but not at the level that encompasses the area that now makes up the City of Toronto… but at a regional level, across the GTA. The key problems afflicting the GTA are to a large extent the result of a truly, coordinated, coherent, regional-wide strategy to address issues of land use, transit, transportation, economic development, etc. The oft-quoted wisdom these days seems to be that “cities” are the economic power-houses of the future… But when you really look at the research, it turns out that the key to success is not a strong “city” but a “city-region” with a coordinated vision in key areas. The way things are in the GTA, ever municipality seems to be doing best for itself, often to the detriment of its municipal neighbors. No single municipality can solve these issues on its own. Yes, it would be nice if the GTA municipalities just learned to get along. But what’s really needed is for the Province to mandate some regional planning body that would somehow adhere to principles of local democracy. Some might see Metrolinx as a step in this direction, but it didn’t really seem too democratic, and it’s purvue seemed much too narrow… especially when one considers that transit planning is probably of little value when done in isolation from land-use planning.
@Samg
I totally agree with you, one of the biggest failings of Metro Toronto was that it was too small and rigid to encompass the growth of the region – it wasn’t a true ‘metropolitan’ government, it didn’t cover the entire metropolitan area, and as a result it wasn’t as effective as it could have been in directing development.
I agree with your point about city regions, too – Canada’s Technology Triangle in the Waterloo region is good evidence of this. I am really eager to see how the coming Provincial election will play out in regards to this – is there a future for regional development in the GTA?