Lower Mainland mayors are ready to give an early thumbs up to a plan that would increase TransLink’s budget by nearly 50 per cent – so long as the money comes from the province’s controversial carbon tax.
Members of TransLink’s Mayor’s Council on Regional Transportation have called a press conference for noon today, where it’s expected the mayors will wade into the highly-charged issue of who pays for the Lower Mainland’s transit network.
The mayors are expected to tentatively endorse a plan for cash-strapped TransLink to boost its yearly revenues by $450 million over its current $1-billion budget. But the mayors want new ideas like the provincial carbon tax and a proposed port container tax to pay for a chunk of it – rather than a smorgasbord of raised property taxes, fare hikes and proposed vehicle levies.
Carbon tax revenue currently goes towards tax reductions in B.C.’s effort to label the controversial fee as “revenue-neutral.”
Wednesday’s announcement will come amidst a provincial election campaign in which B.C.'s first-in-North-America carbon tax has been hotly debated.
“This does nothing towards moving Metro Vancouver residents from their cars towards public transportation,” a working proposal states. “… Applying the carbon tax revenue collected from the Metro region directly toward the broadening of transportation options will directly benefit the public.
“This approach will allow the Ministry to provide measurable benefit to any region paying the tax … the taxpayer will only see the point in a carbon tax if they have readily available low-cost alternatives to current fuel consumption – applying this tax, as an offset to current transportation needs is sound policy.”
City of Langley Mayor Peter Fassbender, one of 21 regional mayors that make up the council, said the mayors’ message to TransLink and the province would be clear.
“We don’t believe that the local property tax payer is the vehicle … to increase revenue,” Fassbender said. “That means we have to find some other sources.”
Municipal sources now make 65 per cent of TransLink funding, the mayors say, up from 53 per cent when the regional transit authority was first created in 1999.
At the same time, the provincial share of TransLink’s funding has dropped to 35 per cent, from 47 per cent, over the same time period.
The mayors say property taxes, meanwhile, have made up the bulk of the increases: Up to 28 per cent this year from 18 per cent a decade ago.
“The provincial government has over the last several years significantly reduced income taxes and sales taxes and is now forcing local governments to ‘claw’ these ‘lost’ public revenues back through the introduction of new or increased local fees and taxes,” the proposal states.
Delta Mayor Lois Jackson says TransLink must look beyond local taxpayers for new revenue.
“I think the majority of mayors right from the very beginning have been very concerned about transportation costs being borne by the local property tax,” Jackson said.
“I’m very concerned that we haven’t got the right combination [of funding sources],” Jackson said.
It’s estimated carbon tax funds could cover up to $300 million a year for the Metro Vancouver region.
The mayors’ proposal also includes discussions on other revenue sources, such as a “container tax” on the region’s ports, with the money raised going towards increasing road capacity.
“In principle, the capacity of [the region’s] road system could be increased using the revenues from such a tax, which would act to decrease congestion on the region’s roads that would act to reduce the travel time for container traffic within and through the region,” the proposal states.
Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson was unavailable for comment on the proposal Tuesday evening. A written statement provided by his office did not touch on the tax.
“We need bold investment in public transit across the region, both for the economy and our environment,” Robertson was quoted as saying. “I'm hopeful we'll get consensus from the Metro mayors on a plan that provides a long-term, sustainable funding model for public transit.”
Surrey Mayor Dianne Watts, the chair of the Mayors’ Council, declined comment before Wednesday’s announcement.
Either way, 2009 will be a pivotal year for beleaguered TransLink. Its private board of directors must submit its long-term plans – and how to pay for them – later this summer and the Mayors’ Council, in turn, must approve the plan by October.
At the moment, TransLink is plugging a $150-million yearly budget shortfall with reserve funds, money that’s expected to run out in 2011. It says the $450 million extra needed will cover the shortfall, plus TransLink’s share of B.C.’s transit plan announced by the province last year. Anything less, and TransLink warns services will be cut.
“Nobody wants to pay more and that’s a fact,” said Langley’s Fassbender. “The other reality is unless you have more to run the system we’re going to have to cut it back.
“Once the election is over, we’ll have to sit down with whoever the government is and negotiate.”
Irwin Loy reports for Vancouver 24 Hours.
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freebear
2 years ago
No more Rebate? No more Tax Cut(s)?
Can you imagine Campbell announcing bthat the carbon tax is no longer revenue neutral and will be used for actual solutions to increasing green house gas emmissions?
Didn't think so!
Peter Dimitrov
2 years ago
Continued Authoritarianism or Democracy -that is the Choice!
I find these comments highly noteworthy:
"The provincial share of TransLink’s funding has dropped to 35 per cent, from 47 per cent.."
“The provincial government has over the last several years significantly reduced income taxes and sales taxes and is now forcing local governments to ‘claw’ these ‘lost’ public revenues back through the introduction of new or increased local fees and taxes,”
At the same time I do not think it equitable that only the Metro Vancouver governmental region benefit from carbon taxes or container port taxes. There are multiple local and First Nations governments in British Columbia that deserve an equitable share of those revenues. The fact that the Province has significantly reduced corporate, income and sales taxes and is forcing local governments to "claw-back" monies in the form of new or increased local fees and taxes is to my mind a huge political issue that should be front and centre in this election..but thusfar isn't. As I have articulated over the last decade there needs to be increased legal status provided to local government so that they can negotiate on a level playing field binding Fiscal Equality legislation that sets out the rights and responsibilities of each level of governments, allocates taxing power accordingly, and allows for the equitable and timely distribution of monies throughout this Province.
Peter Dimitrov
2 years ago
Part Two-Authoritarianism or Democracy
As it is now, consider the metaphor of a family sitting around the table discussing the family budget, some family members are present, others are not invited, there is minimal transparency as to the financial state of affairs or the needs for expenditure, utterances are made by various family members, but the primary decision maker, the Premier and his close advisors, either ignores or gives minimal weight to family concerns, and makes decisions as he sees fit to benefit those whom he sees fit. That "family system" is the metaphor for the elitist, authoritarian system of governance we have in BC, and until that dysfunctional disempowering INSTITUTION of authoritarian governance is remedied or replaced by a more inclusive and equitable democratic collaboration we are going to continue to get poor decisions, corruption, minimal accountability, minimal transparency, discord, excessive rates of poverty and conflict, etc. in this Province. ..and frankly I do not see any provincial political party with the declared intent to tackle that long-standing problem. Democracy, and its sorry state in this Province, is IMO the primary issue in this election. As a voter I sure would like to know where the Parties and their leaders stand, what changes they would seek to make to move us all to a more enhanced democratic system of governance in the public interest, what their thoughts are on STV and other changes needed, how they intend to involve First Nations in governance decision-making as they are required to do as a consequence of a litany of cases affirming aboriginal title and rights in BC, case law which requires meaningful consultation and accomodation to those rights, rights which contain an economic component?
mopled
2 years ago
Double bind
As someone who knows that CO2 is the gas of life and that we are being jerked about, I'm really angry at being put in the position of having to debate a bad tax versus a disastous cap and trade policy.
Both are based on a false premise.
The latest US poll shows now only 34% agree
humans cause global warming/climate change.
" Just one-out-of-three voters (34%) now believe global warming is caused by human activity, the lowest finding yet in Rasmussen Reports national surveying. However, a plurality (48%) of the Political Class believes humans are to blame."
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/environment/energy_updateCO2
Australian media are starting to let some light in.
"Sydney Morning Herald columnist Paul Sheehan, long a warming alarmist, did last week praise Plimer's book to the cooling heavens, and confess he could have been wrong in his own warming faith.
On Wednesday, another shock. The ABC's evangelical PM program did, true, report stock predictions of doom from alarmist scientists, but not before giving air time to two sceptical ones who'd given evidence to a Senate inquiry into the Rudd Government's planned emissions trading scheme.
And so listeners heard environmental engineer Prof Stewart Franks, say the West "has been railroaded into this notion of disastrous climate change for which there is no empirical evidence".
They also heard environmental geologist Prof Bob Carter warn that even if the world resumed warming, the Rudd scheme would at best cut temperatures by a thousandth of a degree, but at an insane cost."
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,25367707-25717,00.html
The US MSM is also starting to crack:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/04/21/cbs-charles-osgood-on-the-sun-and-a-surprising-suggestion/
The false paradigm shows signs of failing, and the NDP must dismount the climate scam tiger soon. First its supporters have to awaken from the programing. I suggest reading some real information.
http://www.friendsofscience.org/
rac
2 years ago
Fixing the Tax is a Good Idea
Well, we need better transit anyway and oil is running out sooner or later. Taxing gas to pay for transit is a good idea regardless of whether you believe in climate change or not.
Improving public transit is also less expensive than people paying to own and operate cars and governments paying to build more highways.
The automobile is the most expensive form of transportation and the most environmentally damaging. By switching to transit, we save money and the environment.
Rod Smelser
2 years ago
How is $14 billion inexpensive?
Taxing gas to pay for transit is a good idea regardless of whether you believe in climate change or not.
Improving public transit is also less expensive than people paying to own and operate cars and governments paying to build more highways.
It's the traditional policy in B.C. to put some of the cost burden of subsidizing urban public transit, and BC Ferries, onto the gas tax. For the Ferries, the highways analogy is clear.
But for urban transit, the policy simply means putting aside normal taxation approaches such as user-pay or beneficiary pay and saying, whether it's reasonable or not, that it's policy to discourage auto traffic through higher priced gasoline. If the beneficiary paid, that would be the property tax payer, since their property values rise with good transit and highway systems.
But it's politics in B.C. to keep property taxes as low as possible, and that's the real reason, and the only real reason, why the gas tax is used to provide the subsidy to transit. This policy started long before concerns about air pollution or global warming, after all.
As for major transit systems being so cheap, how is Premier Campbell's $14 billion transit system cheap? Remember, transit advocates, while stating that some of the package could be cheaper (eg the $3 billion underground squandering to UBC), welcomed the overall package saying it amounted to a nice start. Well, if $14 billion is a nice start, what would a full package be? Would it be $28 billion? $56 billion? Just asking.