Pelham Town Council voted to endorse a correspondence item Wednesday that asks both the provincial and federal governments to redistribute a portion of Ontario’s land transfer tax and the national GST on real estate, respectively, to municipalities for infrastructure funding.
The item, sent in a letter from the Town of Aurora to Premier Doug Ford and outgoing Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, has found support with 80 municipalities, as well as locally.
“We all know that infrastructure is one of the biggest costs faced by any municipality,” Ward 1 Councillor Kevin Ker said. “We go hat in hand to (higher levels of) government on a routine basis, begging for things, and we hope they will be nice enough to hand us some money that has already come out of our pockets that has been collected.”
Mayor Marvin Junkin agreed, citing the Ontario government’s continued downloading of previous responsibilities upon municipalities.
“With all the downloading that is happening in this province … I am definitely going to support the motion,” Junkin said. “We need some help down at the grassroots level.”
That may be an understatement, considering that last year a staff report pegged capital plan costs in Pelham alone at a staggering $184 million over the next decade. Meanwhile, a highly-conservative estimate of Canada’s infrastructure deficit is $270 billion, which is before any economic fallout begins from U.S. president-elect Donald Trump’s expected import tariffs.
The only council member to vote against endorsing the idea was Ward 1’s Wayne Olson, who said it would merely be transferring a tax from one pocket to another.
“I think it’s a false economy,” Olson said. “It’s a tax on wealth, which I think we’re all trying to avoid.”
Ker rebutted that notion, pointing out that an additional tax is what Toronto, for instance, already has in its own municipal land transfer tax – in addition to the provincial levy. He added that Hamilton is currently considering instituting its own, while Premier Doug Ford finds other tax dollars to give back in political gimmickry.
“We have a provincial government that’s proposing to send out a cheque to every person in this province totalling $3 billion,” Ker said.
Drinking pilot project a success
Council received a report on last year’s Peace Park alcohol consumption pilot project, which recorded no issues from either bylaw enforcement or the police. The pilot project allowed consumption of one’s own alcohol in Peace Park, with the exception of occasions where the Town operated a liquor-licenced event. The only reported incident involving enforcement occurred during the latter.
Animal policy deferred for more study
Council deferred a new animal-in-Town-facilities policy after haggling over defining "service animals" versus "support animals." As it stands now, pets are not explicitly banned from Town of Pelham buildings, but a bylaw exists that states they be leashed. A new policy is meant to establish rules around admittance. Solicitor Jennifer Stirton described working on such legislation as “a dog’s breakfast.”
