To begin with, the Canadian Taxpayers Federation is a private organization. according to their website, the organization does not receive government grants, does not have charitable status to enable them to issue income tax receipts and depends entirely upon donations to run their operations. They are, of course free to do what they want to do and run their group as they see fit. That being said, it is hard to believe that any of the proposals that the group made regarding the city of Toronto’s budget can possibly have any effect.
Ontario Director, Tasha Kheiriddin, said in a news release that, "Council must focus on core priorities and make Toronto a safe, well-maintained, and clean place to live. It must cut back on unnecessary spending and find ways of providing services more efficiently to taxpayers." Specific proposals that the Canadian Taxpayers Federation made to city council included freezing residential property taxes, freezing business taxes and prioritizing spending on core services.
as rationale and logical as these arguments sound, telling this particular council to freeze taxes and concentrate on core services is a little like resolving the debate over same sex marriage by advising gays and lesbians to become straight. This council, much like gays and lesbians, are what they are.
Toronto Mayor David Miller is no George Washington. But then neither is he Dalton McGuinty. George, as we all knew never told a lie and Dalton never told the truth. But in the general scheme of things, Miller has been fairly honest and open about where he stands on the issues and stands much closer to Washington. While campaigning during the 2003 municipal elections, Miller promised to stop the bridge to the island and not much else. So far he’s stopped the bridge and not done much else. He received a lot of support from unions and never hid that fact. as far as the safety of the city was concerned, the issue of crime and safety was perhaps the major difference between Miller and his closest rival in the mayoral race, current Ontario Progressive Conservative leader, John Tory. Miller made it clear that crime and the safety of the streets (beyond what was needed to make his beloved homeless safe) were not a priority for him. Miller and his leftist cohorts on city council believe that group hugs are the way to solve crime, not tougher law and order measures. Of course, Toronto Police Chief Julian Fantino doesn’t thinks that the bad guys will lay down their guns to play basketball, but he’s history next month anyway. Undoubtedly, Fantino will be replaced by a girly-man chief who will discuss putting more officers on bicycles with Pam McConnell, Miller’s appointed head of the Toronto Police Services Board, while the two of them sip lattes. In other words, for the CTF to tell council to make the city safe is like telling Fidel Castro to become a capitalist to improve his country. as true as it might be, it will never happen.
The Canadian Taxpayers Federation says that the council should concentrate on core services. Who can name or remember a councillor who felt that his or her main job was to fix potholes, remove snow and collect garbage? What Ms. Kheiriddin thinks is "unnecessary spending" is the entire reason d’être of this council. Reducing the amount of money that they give to their friends in special interest groups ain’t going to stop. Neither will this council attempt to save money by outsourcing jobs that are currently held by highly paid union workers.
Despite sometimes giving the contrary impression, David Miller and his council are not dumb. They know exactly what they are doing. and more importantly, they are doing what they were elected to do. If the majority of voters were really concerned about tax freezes and core services, they would have elected other city representatives and forced themselves to live with a bridge to the island.
Telling council to make Toronto a safer city, improve core services and freeze or lower business and property taxes is a complete waste of time. Not only was this council democratically elected, but they were elected to do what they are doing. Nothing will change until the voters decide that enough is enough. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like that will happen anytime soon.
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