{"id":3741,"date":"2008-10-30T16:39:12","date_gmt":"2008-10-30T20:39:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spacingtoronto.ca\/2008\/10\/30\/city-budget-moves-on-ttc-roads-and-cycling\/"},"modified":"2013-01-21T15:06:22","modified_gmt":"2013-01-21T20:06:22","slug":"city-budget-moves-on-ttc-roads-and-cycling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2008\/10\/30\/city-budget-moves-on-ttc-roads-and-cycling\/","title":{"rendered":"City budget moves on TTC, roads and cycling"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\u00a0<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm4.static.flickr.com\/3027\/2915980703_d88b4e52d7.jpg?v=0\" style=\"width: 500px; height: 333px\" height=\"333\" width=\"500\" \/><\/p>\n<p>At a noon hour budget committee meeting, the City of Toronto publicly launched its <a href=\"http:\/\/network.nationalpost.com\/np\/blogs\/toronto\/archive\/2008\/10\/30\/hall-monitor-city-unveils-2009-capital-budget.aspx\">capital budget<\/a> approval process. While the biggest dollar figures were reserved for TTC and roads, bike lanes play a prominent role in the $1.6 billion spending plan.<\/p>\n<p>Mayor David Miller, budget chief Shelley Carroll and city manager Joe Pennachetti all highlighted the investment of $70.3 million to be spent installing bike lanes between 2009 and 2012. Starting with $8 million in 2009, Miller said that with those funds and the streamlined approvals process, the bike plan will be completed by 2012. The outcome of the <a href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2008\/10\/23\/annette-bike-lane-controversy\/\">Annette bike lane debate<\/a> at today&#8217;s meeting of City Council should be an indicator of whether the City will\u00a0be able to spend the entire cycling budget.<\/p>\n<p>The budget, for a change, comes in $99 million below the City&#8217;s overall debt target (the maximum amount it can borrow) and the City will continue to pay down its existing debt by $225 million per year. Only 40% of the capital budget will be funded out of debt, with the rest coming mostly from federal and provincial governments.<\/p>\n<p>The budget goes to City Council for approval on December 10. The budget committee will be receiving councillor and public comment at meetings in November.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p><strong>Bits and Pieces<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em>Dance Sue-Ann, Dance!<br \/>\n<\/em>With councillors not having a chance to ask questions on the capital budget until November 5, I believe that Councillor Mike Del Grande was using Toronto Sun columnist Sue-Ann Levy to plant a question, though both Ms. Levy and Mr. Del Grande deny this. Del Grande summoned Levy to his side during the media scrum after the budget announcement. The two whispered and giggled back and forth. Then with Del Grande sporting a big smile, Levy launched into a question on one of Del Grande&#8217;s pet issues, <em>cashing in the Toronto Hydro bank note to pay for environmental initiatives <\/em>(a correction was made to this sentence, Spacing regrets the error).<\/p>\n<p><em><strong>Ed. note:<\/strong> Spacing was in contact with Toronto Sun editorial page editor Rob Granatstein regarding the above paragraph. Granatstein said that Sue-Ann Levy and Councillor Del Grande told him that they were discussing the City&#8217;s debt level, not Levy&#8217;s next question. Councillor Del Grande says debt level was the topic of conversation and the insinuation of a &#8220;planted question&#8221; by Ms. Levy is not true.<br \/>\n<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Selective memory<\/em><br \/>\nAt the budget media scrum one journalist asked the mayor about the impact of the federal cabinet shuffle on Toronto and several questions were asked in the context of economic uncertainty.<\/p>\n<p>Miller dismissed the importance of GTA Conservatives <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thestar.com\/news\/canada\/article\/527382\">getting cabinet posts<\/a>, preferring to\u00a0shower praise on\u00a0John Baird. Miller says he and Baird, who\u00a0this\u00a0morning was tapped to be\u00a0Stephen Harper&#8217;s minister of transportation,\u00a0enjoy a good relationship and that his background as Minister of Community and Social Services in the Harris government gives Baird a better understanding of the city&#8217;s issues than his predecessor.<\/p>\n<p>Miller&#8217;s probably just\u00a0trying to play\u00a0nice because surely he remembers that COMSOC was responsible for some of the most mean spirited attacks on vulnerable Ontarians, and especially Torontonians, during the Harris years.<\/p>\n<p>Then asked why in tough economic times other levels of government would want to give Toronto infrastructure money, Miller thought Baird would see the wisdom in Keynesian economic policy. I&#8217;m not so sure unabashed neo-cons like Baird are big fans of Keynes. Just a guess.<\/p>\n<p><em>Rumour mill<br \/>\n<\/em>Here&#8217;s the latest on three of the\u00a0most talked about potential candidates to go up against Miller in 2010.<\/p>\n<p>George Smitherman apparently pulled back his not so subtle pre-campaign to be mayor when local and provincial Liberals gave him a lukewarm response to the trial hot air balloon he floated earlier this year. Provincial Liberals are particularly perturbed by the thought of Furious George picking fights with a Liberal premier. But then Smitherman was seen working the municipal circuit again in late summer so he can&#8217;t be counted out yet.<\/p>\n<p>Rocco Rossi, the head of the Heart and Stroke Foundation, former Bay Street executive and virtual unknown in municipal political circles has had his name dangled repeatedly. Rumour is that the one pushing Rossi&#8217;s name is Toronto&#8217;s Lastman-era backroom boy in chief, Paul Godfrey.<\/p>\n<p>That Godfrey is seen spending his time pushing Rossi says more about Councillor Karen Stintz than it does about Rossi. Stintz has been lining up her run for mayor since before the last election. In the past two years, Stintz&#8217;s formerly chaotic style has been reigned in by her main backer Paul Sutherland, the former Tory\u00a0councillor and current lobbyist. Problem is, Sutherland is slowly but surely painting Stintz into the same corner Jane Pitfield was in. Like Pitfield, Stintz has been convinced that her right-wing voting record won&#8217;t sell well in Toronto. Now\u00a0Stintz has\u00a0moved much closer to the centre and votes with Miller much more often than she used to. Come 2010, Stintz will have about as many wedge issues as Pitfield but even less tangible experience &#8212; a recipe for political disaster.<\/p>\n<p><em><br \/>\n<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Photograph by <a href=\"http:\/\/flickr.com\/photos\/bensonkua\/\">bensonuka<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u00a0 At a noon hour budget committee meeting, the City of Toronto publicly launched its capital budget approval process. While the biggest dollar figures were reserved for TTC and roads, bike lanes play a prominent role in the $1.6 billion spending plan. Mayor David Miller, budget chief Shelley Carroll and city manager Joe Pennachetti all<a href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2008\/10\/30\/city-budget-moves-on-ttc-roads-and-cycling\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"sr-only\">&#8220;City budget moves on TTC, roads and cycling&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4037,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7,21758,33,2,9,8],"tags":[10729,10730,2211,756,6435,424,408,10727,425,4838,4171,45,6245,2021,983,10724,1079,5765,1460,1969,7964,426,6482,1435,1604,6038,53,4468,10725,26,44,4844,10726,10731,1276,2092,1078,19,1642,10728,849,391],"class_list":["post-3741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bikes","category-community","category-housing","category-politics","category-traffic","category-transit","tag-bank-note","tag-budget-media-scrum","tag-chief","tag-city-council","tag-city-manager","tag-columnist","tag-councillor","tag-councillor-and-current-lobbyist","tag-david-miller","tag-editorial-page-editor","tag-executive","tag-funding-cities","tag-george-smitherman","tag-harris-government","tag-head","tag-heart-and-stroke-foundation","tag-jane-pitfield","tag-joe-pennachetti","tag-journalist","tag-karen-stintz","tag-liberal-premier","tag-mayor","tag-media-scrum","tag-mike-del-grande","tag-minister","tag-minister-of-transportation","tag-parliament-hill","tag-paul-godfrey","tag-paul-sutherland","tag-people","tag-queens-park","tag-rob-granatstein","tag-rocco-rossi","tag-rumour-mill-here","tag-shelley-carroll","tag-stephen-harper","tag-sue-ann-levy","tag-toronto","tag-toronto-sun","tag-tory-councillor-and-current-lobbyist","tag-transportation","tag-usd"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>City budget moves on TTC, roads and cycling - Spacing Toronto<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2008\/10\/30\/city-budget-moves-on-ttc-roads-and-cycling\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"City budget moves on TTC, roads and cycling - Spacing Toronto\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"\u00a0 At a noon hour budget committee meeting, the City of Toronto publicly launched its capital budget approval process. While the biggest dollar figures were reserved for TTC and roads, bike lanes play a prominent role in the $1.6 billion spending plan. 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