City services: Something's gotta give

Recently I've been chatting with friends about how tax money is spent on city services. Torontonians expect the city to operate smoothly, and when glitches occur, we notice. Whether it's the efficiency of garbage pick-up, the quality of TTC service, the condition of our city streets, the presence of public libraries and public health services, or the cleanliness of our parks and attractions, we expect a lot from our city.

My husband and I own our home and the property taxes we pay are not insignificant. I understand the principles of give and take - living in the city is expensive, but we have beautiful parks, many public services for children, families and the elderly, a world-class public library system, and decent roads. The city water I drink is clean and tastes good. The TTC, for all its recent troubles, gets me to where I need to go. Those of us who commute by bike are fortunate to be able to do so fairly safely.

But of course, there is never enough money for everything. Specifically, not enough tax money is generated to support the wide range of city services we want and expect. You can see at a glance what I mean when you take a look at this chart illustrating city expenses vs. city revenues provided by the City of Toronto web site.

So, what's a city to do? The answer is, we must compromise. But how, and on what?

In upcoming weeks and months, the mayoral candidates will be ramping up their campaigns. When listening to the positions and promises from the candidates, consider framing their arguments through a different lens: rather than focusing on what you want from your city, consider what you'd be willing to give up.

In a world of limited resources, where are you willing to compromise? Would you trade improved TTC service in exchange for reduced health resources for families and seniors? Would you pay more for public child care in exchange for more frequent garbage pick-up? How do you compare the need for affordable housing with the demand for clean water?

I certainly don't have the answers, but it's a different way of thinking about the candidates, and it's a perspective I'm going to try. At the very least, it will provide me with a new way of evaluating the campaigns as we get closer to Election Day on October 25.

About Kimberly Silk

Comments

[Sonny Yeung]

City services could improve if more City Workers actually live in Toronto and understand the need to improve customer service.
About $3.6 billion of the property taxes collected go to the City's operating budget. The education amount for each property is about $981 per household...which is a long term investment for the future.

[Jose]

Exactly. Those city workers who do not live in Toronto must be replaced by those who do, and in the first place, those who do not live in Toronto musn't even be considered during the application process.

[Eric]

Why should we give anything up. It is verified that city workers are paid 20% more than the private sector workers who pay their salaries. They also do not seem to work at a private sector pace. Which leads me to observe that if 15% of them were laid off and the remainder took a 20% cut in pay, we could keep our services and start on the long road to making this city financially viable again. Just like it was in the 60's before the public unions started to got a death grip on our citizens and city council.