TORONTO – Mayor Rob Ford remains adamant in his efforts to cut the land transfer tax by 10 per cent.
“I’ve been committed to the land transfer tax; I’m doing what the taxpayers want me to do. They’ve asked me to reduce it, I’m reducing it by 10 per cent,” the mayor said at a city hall press conference Wednesday.
The land transfer tax generated $344.5 million in 2012.
A 10 per cent cut to the tax could amount to approximately $34.5 million being removed from the city’s revenue.
Ford said to make up the gap, the city will have to “find efficiencies.”
But a city report before the mayor’s executive committee calls the tax a “key sustainable own-source city revenue since its 2008 inception.”
Von Palmer, a representative of the Toronto Real Estate Board said the tax can’t be relied on to fund city services.
“What happens when the real estate market slows down, it’s already starting to,” Palmer said. “And then what?”
The city’s budget chief says cutting the tax won’t be a top priority.
“I don’t think it will be a priority,” budget chief Frank Di Giorgio said. “I know the mayor wants us to look at it as a priority.”
Di Giorgio said however, it is possible.
“I think a 10 per cent reduction in the land transfer tax is doable,” he said. “You might not like the implications.”
But Councillor Gord Perks questions whether city councillors are willing to endanger some city services by cutting the tax.
“I don’t think a majority of city councillors want to create a $30-35 million hole in our finances and cut the services Torontonians depend on to deliver it,” Perks said.
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