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Not much change promised for Ontario's municipalities this election
26 August 2011
Ontario’s provincial leaders are promising a lot this election. It’s what they’re not promising that is more troubling to me.
I listened to the leaders of the three parties speak at the AMO convention this week, and heard a lot of promises, a lot of justification, some blame, some excuses and some puffery. But for everything we're being offered, no one is talking about repairing the relationship between municipalities and the province.*
Sure, everyone talks about “partnerships’ with municipalities, but it’s not a partnership when the other side has all the cards, sets the rules and controls the bank. None of the leaders seem to want to end what is basically a subservient situation for municipalities. Municipalities are basically serfs in their lack of real authority and control. It's not a partnership for us on the receiving end.
The relationship between Canadian provinces and their municipalities has not changed since the British North America Act of 1867. We are locked into a Victorian-era political and social model that has been painfully outdated for at least a century. In 2011, it is a sorry political dinosaur, one that should long ago have gone extinct and let a new mammal evolve into the role. But there is no political will at the provincial or federal level to change it. The aged, unequal model benefits provincial and federal politicians, even though it hurts and hampers municipalities.
Canadian municipalities are the most immediate, most important, most accessible, most open and least powerful level of government. Even local planning documents like Official Plans require provincial approval. Although local governments are far more able to respond to and resolve issues faster than higher-tier governments, local governments often have to go to a higher level to get approvals to act on their own behalf.
Municipalities get the vast bulk of their revenue from property taxes, which in turn is based on an outdated and inefficient model of property assessment. In Ontario, that is even enshrined in law as the Municipal Property Assessment Corp (MPAC). This takes away control of local assessment values from towns and cities and puts it into a centralized system which many property owners liken to throwing darts at random numbers. Property assessment systems like MPAC are not capable of responding rapidly, cannot balance shifts in local economies with ability to pay, cannot react to economic swings like the recent recession, and rely heavily on area-wide real estate sales to determine generic values, rather than on individual analysis.
At least half the revenue collected by many municipalities through property taxes goes to outside agencies like school boards or upper-tier governments like counties. Provinces love to polish their budgets by downloading services and their associated costs onto municipalities. Makes them look good when the financial numbers show they're cutting costs, but makes it increasingly difficult for municipalities to meet their own internal costs for services and infrastructure through taxation. Municipalities often have to beg provincial and federal governments for funding to meet their needs even though they collect enough before it gets divided up and sent to other agencies.
Municipal governments shoulder considerable legal burdens over financial management, openness, accountability, in-camera meetings and transparency – laws that provincial and federal governments and their agencies don’t have to abide by. Municipalities can’t run a deficit, but provinces can, and frequently do. Everything municipalities do has to be open, except for a narrowly proscribed group of in-camera issues, and even then residents can appeal to investigate the validity of those meetings. Provincial ministries and agencies operate without any similar requirement for openness and - as we've found with the wind turbine issue - can sometimes override local laws and planning with a wave of a pen and no input from those affected by their decisions.
In his recent book, Taking Back Our Cities, author Gord Hume calls this double standard between the rules governing municipalities and higher levels of government “astonishing.” I'd use much stronger words.**
Most municipal politicians are aware of, and agonize over, the regulations that hamstring their ability to effectively govern locally. Cities and provincial associations of municipalities argue for changes in governance and taxation to better be able to serve their residents. But provincial leaders show no interest in fixing the relationship that has been broken for more than a century. When anyone suggests a direction that empowers municipalities, the spectre of constitutional change is raised and politicians scatter for their bunkers, screaming the sky is falling.
The time for change is long overdue. Municipalities need a seat at the table when decisions are made that affect us. We need to be consulted. we need to be listened to, we need to be heeded. We need a voice in debates about health care, taxation, infrastructure, arbitration, energy, policing and transportation. But it’s not likely to come under a government of any of the current political leaders this election.
It's going to require a considerable, concerted effort from the municipalities themselves, a lot of political will and political pressure, and perhaps even collective civil disobedience from municipal leaders to force the province to change the antiquated rules and make municipalities real partners in the process.***
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* To be fair, PC leader Tim Hudak has promised to fix some of the problems - like reducing the overabundance of provincial agencies, boards and commissions run by unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats, that oversee many municipal affairs; to fix the arbitration process that has been the bane of municipal contract negotiations for decades, and to make the gas tax rebate more equitable, without the stringent requirements it currently carries. But the overall relationship between the province and municipalities - actually making municipalities partners at the table and breaking away from the current model - is not in his radar, nor is it on that of the other two.
** Good book for municipal politicians to read. Hume makes these arguments and others, clearly outlining the problems and offers some solutions to changing the relationship so we all benefit. Although one gets a whiff of William Lyon Mackenzie in his words, he stops short of calling for rebellion.
*** What, for example, if all Ontario municipalities collectively refused to pay downloaded costs or provide downloaded services? Refused to accept MPAC judgments on assessment and set their own? Changed their own Official Plans without seeking provincial approval? Refused to collect taxes for school boards? Offered tax bonusing, land and other benefits to attract companies and jobs (currently against Ontario laws)? Refused to allow wind turbines to be built within their borders despite existing provincial approvals? It would take more than one municipality to take such action, of course, but if even a dozen, or better yet 100, of Ontario's 440 municipalities did it, what a message that would send to the province!
I listened to the leaders of the three parties speak at the AMO convention this week, and heard a lot of promises, a lot of justification, some blame, some excuses and some puffery. But for everything we're being offered, no one is talking about repairing the relationship between municipalities and the province.*
Sure, everyone talks about “partnerships’ with municipalities, but it’s not a partnership when the other side has all the cards, sets the rules and controls the bank. None of the leaders seem to want to end what is basically a subservient situation for municipalities. Municipalities are basically serfs in their lack of real authority and control. It's not a partnership for us on the receiving end.
The relationship between Canadian provinces and their municipalities has not changed since the British North America Act of 1867. We are locked into a Victorian-era political and social model that has been painfully outdated for at least a century. In 2011, it is a sorry political dinosaur, one that should long ago have gone extinct and let a new mammal evolve into the role. But there is no political will at the provincial or federal level to change it. The aged, unequal model benefits provincial and federal politicians, even though it hurts and hampers municipalities.
Canadian municipalities are the most immediate, most important, most accessible, most open and least powerful level of government. Even local planning documents like Official Plans require provincial approval. Although local governments are far more able to respond to and resolve issues faster than higher-tier governments, local governments often have to go to a higher level to get approvals to act on their own behalf.
Municipalities get the vast bulk of their revenue from property taxes, which in turn is based on an outdated and inefficient model of property assessment. In Ontario, that is even enshrined in law as the Municipal Property Assessment Corp (MPAC). This takes away control of local assessment values from towns and cities and puts it into a centralized system which many property owners liken to throwing darts at random numbers. Property assessment systems like MPAC are not capable of responding rapidly, cannot balance shifts in local economies with ability to pay, cannot react to economic swings like the recent recession, and rely heavily on area-wide real estate sales to determine generic values, rather than on individual analysis.
At least half the revenue collected by many municipalities through property taxes goes to outside agencies like school boards or upper-tier governments like counties. Provinces love to polish their budgets by downloading services and their associated costs onto municipalities. Makes them look good when the financial numbers show they're cutting costs, but makes it increasingly difficult for municipalities to meet their own internal costs for services and infrastructure through taxation. Municipalities often have to beg provincial and federal governments for funding to meet their needs even though they collect enough before it gets divided up and sent to other agencies.
Municipal governments shoulder considerable legal burdens over financial management, openness, accountability, in-camera meetings and transparency – laws that provincial and federal governments and their agencies don’t have to abide by. Municipalities can’t run a deficit, but provinces can, and frequently do. Everything municipalities do has to be open, except for a narrowly proscribed group of in-camera issues, and even then residents can appeal to investigate the validity of those meetings. Provincial ministries and agencies operate without any similar requirement for openness and - as we've found with the wind turbine issue - can sometimes override local laws and planning with a wave of a pen and no input from those affected by their decisions.
In his recent book, Taking Back Our Cities, author Gord Hume calls this double standard between the rules governing municipalities and higher levels of government “astonishing.” I'd use much stronger words.**
Most municipal politicians are aware of, and agonize over, the regulations that hamstring their ability to effectively govern locally. Cities and provincial associations of municipalities argue for changes in governance and taxation to better be able to serve their residents. But provincial leaders show no interest in fixing the relationship that has been broken for more than a century. When anyone suggests a direction that empowers municipalities, the spectre of constitutional change is raised and politicians scatter for their bunkers, screaming the sky is falling.
The time for change is long overdue. Municipalities need a seat at the table when decisions are made that affect us. We need to be consulted. we need to be listened to, we need to be heeded. We need a voice in debates about health care, taxation, infrastructure, arbitration, energy, policing and transportation. But it’s not likely to come under a government of any of the current political leaders this election.
It's going to require a considerable, concerted effort from the municipalities themselves, a lot of political will and political pressure, and perhaps even collective civil disobedience from municipal leaders to force the province to change the antiquated rules and make municipalities real partners in the process.***
~~~~~
* To be fair, PC leader Tim Hudak has promised to fix some of the problems - like reducing the overabundance of provincial agencies, boards and commissions run by unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats, that oversee many municipal affairs; to fix the arbitration process that has been the bane of municipal contract negotiations for decades, and to make the gas tax rebate more equitable, without the stringent requirements it currently carries. But the overall relationship between the province and municipalities - actually making municipalities partners at the table and breaking away from the current model - is not in his radar, nor is it on that of the other two.
** Good book for municipal politicians to read. Hume makes these arguments and others, clearly outlining the problems and offers some solutions to changing the relationship so we all benefit. Although one gets a whiff of William Lyon Mackenzie in his words, he stops short of calling for rebellion.
*** What, for example, if all Ontario municipalities collectively refused to pay downloaded costs or provide downloaded services? Refused to accept MPAC judgments on assessment and set their own? Changed their own Official Plans without seeking provincial approval? Refused to collect taxes for school boards? Offered tax bonusing, land and other benefits to attract companies and jobs (currently against Ontario laws)? Refused to allow wind turbines to be built within their borders despite existing provincial approvals? It would take more than one municipality to take such action, of course, but if even a dozen, or better yet 100, of Ontario's 440 municipalities did it, what a message that would send to the province!
Hudak’s bad deal for cities, the Star's take on Hudak's speech at AMO:
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Unbelievably – yet again – here was a Conservative politician talking about solving provincial budget woes on the backs of municipalities. We’ve been there, done that, and our cities still haven’t recovered from the misguided policies of Mike Harris’s Conservative government of the 1990s.
and this on the outgoing AMO president's speech:
Hume's farewell speech
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