Council debates taxes, tolls, revenue tools

TORONTO – Taxes, tolls and other revenue tools were on the table at city council Wednesday as councillors debated which taxes – if any – they recommend the province use to pay for transit.

The city almost missed its chance to have a say in any new taxes before Metrolinx, the regional transit body, puts out its recommendations May 27.

Last month, Mayor Rob Ford’s executive committee deferred the debate until May 28. But city councillors upset by the decision, organized a two-thirds majority voting to bring the motion to city council.

The city’s trying to pick which transit-funding taxes, tolls or levies – referred to as ‘revenue tools’ – it wants the province to implement.

TTC Chair Karen Stintz said Tuesday that it’s important council have the debate to let the province know which tools would be detrimental to Toronto residents and businesses.

Despite the seeming inevitability of the taxes, much of the debate focused on issues other than the specific revenue tools.

Deputy Mayor Doug Holyday suggested that transit advocates on council should have waited until the May 28 for the transit debate.

Councillor Giorgio Mammoliti asked city staff if council even had the authority to discuss the motion.

Glenn De Bearemaeker, a Scarborough councillor, gave an impassioned speech late on Wednesday evening advocating for a portion of the money raised through taxes be dedicated to a subway in Scarborough.

“Our LRT is busier than many of your subway lines already,” De Baeremarker said. “We have thousands of people going through that system every single day. The demand exists. From the day you open that subway you will have thousands of people there.”

“This is the right subway, at the right location, for the right price,” he added.

Mayor Rob Ford and his brother Councillor Doug Ford have also been vocal supporters of a subway in Scarborough but are among the councillors who did not want Wednesday’s debate to take place.

Rather than revenue tools, they have suggested finding “efficiencies” in the provincial budget and using revenue from a proposed casino to help build the subway.

The revenue tools will fund the approximately $50 billion plan headed by Metrolinx to increase public transit throughout the region.

Part of the funding will also pay for the downtown-relief-line – a project TTC CEO Andy Byford reaffirmed was the TTC’s next priority.

The province has yet to announce which revenue tools will be placed upon Ontarians in order to pay for transit but in the 2013 Ontario budget, Kathleen Wynne’s government introduced the first stages of a plan to install high-occupancy toll lanes throughout the GTA.

Tolled high-occupancy lanes, according to the 2013 Ontario budget, could raise up to $300 million a year to fund public transit.