Trudeau’s Refugees May Force a 6% Increase in Property Taxes for This Sanctuary City
[Justin Trudeau has flooded Canada with refugees. A sometime drama teacher, he loves virtue signalling, the dramatic gesture. So, having welcomed the flood, he has failed to back it up with sufficient funding. Is this just incompetence or is he using the “refugees” most of whom are non-White to further replace Canada’s founding/settler people? Woke Toronto some years ago declared itself a sanctuary city, eager to welcome “refugees”, legal or illegal. Not the cost of housing thousands is coming home to roost. Bewildered refugees, often fresh from the airport, find themselves on the streets, the city shelters full to bursting. Often poor native born Canadians cannot find a bed. Toronto City Council is now facing a 6 per cent tax increase to shelter Trudeau’s folly, on top of an already crippling planned 10 per cent property tax hike. — Paul Fromm]
We have to fix things that are broken’: Toronto budget proposes current tax pain for future gain
Toronto residents could see a property tax hike of as much as 16 per cent if Ottawa doesn’t fund shelter for refugee claimants. By Alyshah HashamCity Hall BureauBen SpurrCity Hall BureauDavid RiderCity Hall Bureau Chief Wednesday, January 10, 2024 5 min to read Article was updated 36 mins ago
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This will be a painful year for Toronto taxpayers but one that will leave the city in better shape after years of neglect.
That’s the pitch behind a historic 10.5 per cent property tax increase proposed by city staff on Wednesday, requiring the average homeowner to pay close to $400 more a year, in the midst of an affordability crisis.
But this year’s $17 billion operating budget rollout also comes with a threat from the city’s budget chief aimed squarely at the Trudeau government. If the city doesn’t receive $250 million in funding from Ottawa to house the growing number of vulnerable refugee claimants arriving in the city, budget chief Shelley Carroll said she’d be proposing an additional six per cent “federal impacts levy” that would bring the total tax hike to 16.5 per cent, about $600 on average. ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW https://imasdk.googleapis.com/js/core/bridge3.609.1_en.html#goog_1855862712
“That is the potential crisis we face,” Carroll said, ahead of the spending plan being presented to council’s budget committee.
After budget committee approved the plan, Mayor Olivia Chow would not endorse or reject the 10.5 per cent property tax hike, or say whether she thought the increase was unaffordable. Instead, she said she would be listening closely to what Toronto residents have to say in public consultations before releasing her version of the budget on Feb 1.
“We have to fix the things that are broken and the financial mess,” she said, noting the city faced a $1.8-billion deficit driven largely by transit and shelter costs, which have skyrocketed during the pandemic.
The operating budget proposed Wednesday, which increased by $900 million from last year, freezes TTC fares for 2024, slightly increases the police funding (though not as much as requested by the Toronto Police Services Board) and invests in expanding a mental health crisis response service. It increases spending by $152 million for shelter, transit, emergency services and long-term care as well as increasing hours at some public libraries.