Editorial
February 22, 2005
This week, Toronto City Council will be voting on its budget for the 2005-2006 year. Some of it will be wasted no matter what you want to call it: waste, pork barrel, largesse, patronage, feeding at the public trough, feathering their own nests, or corruption.
During the election campaign leading up to David Miller's November 2003 win, he promised that as Toronto's Mayor that he would change the way things are done at city hall. He promised City Hall would be open and transparent.
Instead, other than for the MFP inquiry, it looks like Mayor Miller is doing his best to use his broom to sweep City Hall's fiscal irresponsibilities under the council chamber's rug.
The city budget is to balloon to $7.1 billion, while the mayor puts all the blame on the province.
It is true that the provincial government did download all public housing, including that downloaded to them by the federal government, onto the city. The province also cut all support for public transit. Nevertheless, the city has done little to cut its skyrocketing budgets, preferring to see how it can increase property taxes, and fees.
In addition to the 3 to 4 per cent increase in residential property taxes, there is the hidden $195 million annual tax hidden from taxpayers as ever increasing "profit" by city-owned Toronto Hydro.
One of Mayor David Miller's first acts was to bring in a "retention bonus" program for Toronto's fire fighters, to mirror the one agreed to for Toronto Police. The police services had asked for the bonus to stop the loss of experienced officers to the private sector. The problem with also giving it to fire fighers is that their union never asked for it and there are no retention problems with keeping firemen, though the union did support Mr. Miller during his election campaign.
The ranks of the City of Toronto's outside and inside workers continue to explode in numbers, and by coincidence both of their unions endorsed David Miller's election campaign for mayor.
The increasing numbers of city employees amazes us as it comes at the same time of ever decreasing city services.
When balancing a budget, it is necessary not only to look at sources of revenues but at your spending too. Most city councillors, as well as the mayor don't seem to perceive this as the taxpayer's money, but as their own to do with as they wish.
Residents and businesses are overburdened by Toronto's municipal taxes and fees, while spending on Toronto politician's pet projects continue to expand.
There is no new openess at City Hall when it comes to trying to find out about city expenditures on "consultants". Some of these consultants in the past have been exposed as friends and associates of city politicians and bureaucrats.
The over $50 million grants pie has grown over the two years of the new Mayor with little oversight as to what benefits, if any, these bring to residents Plus, there is a plethora of "contracts" for services most of which are really grants hidden from public scrutiny. There is the Toronto atmospheric Fund, the Tenant Defense Fund, and then all the agencies and boards which further obscure where the public's taxdollars are spent such as Toronto artscape and the Green Tourism association.
Too often, city councillors and bureaucrats create new programs or expand existing ones to fund their favourite organizations and campaign supporters rather than setting priorities for expenditures based upon what services residents actually need and want, versus how much money there presently is to pay for it all.
Reviews of these programs are often done in reports by the very organizations, who have received these grants and contracts. at other times these reviews are done by the city department who recommended the program and so should be responsible for any failure, or by a group of favoured consultants city departments use to write whitewash reports to support the continuing need for these expenditures.
Four recommendations we are making as a long-time watchdog of Toronto
City Hall are:
• Create budgets based upon existing revenues, eliminating pet projects that are outside of the city's mandate, and prioritizing the rest so that important services are not cut back, while waste is reduced.
• Transfer some funding from all departments to the auditors office, and transfer all responsibility for project and program review reports to the auditor's office to ensure they are arms lengths reviews to end the conflicts of interest.
• Provide information on all grants and contracts of $10,000 or more, including the names of the contractors or organization, the name of their chair or president and two other executive members, and that of three senior employees in a cross searchable online database available to the public. Make it an offense to breakdown programs into smaller ones less than the $10,000 in an effort to hide such funding.
• Create an oath to be signed by both politicians and bureaucrats to remind them that their first responsibility to taxpayers is to spend the public's money wisely on cost effective services that benefit the public and that are within the mandate of the Corporation of the City of Toronto.
Between the federal government's adscam, shovelling money to their Liberal campaign contributors, the Ernie Eves Conservative government giving millions in untendered contracts from Ontario's Hydro One to their backroom boys, and now Mayor Miller's NDP dominated city council spending money like there is no tomorrow, it is no wonder voters have grown cynical of politicians and the political system.