Mayor Miller is delighted with himself. He is taking great pride in Toronto’s balanced budget. But, Toronto’s homeowners aren’t smiling. They are facing a 3.75% increase in property tax as well as the new Land Transfer Tax. Why isn’t anyone reminding Mayor Miller that one of his campaign promises was to keep property taxes at the rate of inflation? Maybe someone forgot to tell him that the rate of inflation according to Statistics Canada is 2.4%.

The prevailing wind is that Mayor Miller should have cleaned his own house before breaking his promise. Why isn’t the budget committee looking for more ways to cut costs? Why should they? The Provincial Government is kicking in 188 million dollars. Queen’s Park is contributing 149 million dollars for transit and in addition they are taking on 39 million dollars in social service costs that had previously been the responsibility of the City of Toronto. Mayor Miller’s detractors say that the only reason that he was able to announce a balanced budget is that the provincial government gave him the money upfront this time instead of having to bail him out down the road.

The City of Toronto actually has 2 budgets - an operating budget and capital budget. The operating budget – 8.2 billion dollars to be reviewed by the budget committee next week - pays for:
• Police
• Fire
• EMS
• TTC
• Waste collection
• Recycling
• Libraries
• Parks and Recreation
• Child care
• Rent
• Fuel
• Electricity

The City of Toronto capital budget – 1.610 billion dollars, which was approved by Toronto City Council last December - pays for:

• Construction and maintenance of roads
• Maintenance and construction of city assets and infrastructure
• Transit vehicles
• Major equipment
• Major facilities

Does the balanced budget sound very balanced to you? And how is Mayor Miller portraying himself as a hero when all that he has done is to break yet another promise?