Thank you to all the residents who filled the Council Chambers to overflowing capacity last Thursday evening, to participate in Clearview’s Budget Town Hall meeting.
As was the case at our Ward 4 Town Hall meeting in Creemore, taxpayers came out to express their concerns about higher property taxes and more broadly about the rising cost of services in Clearview.
A common sentiment heard from many residents attending both meetings was “I have to cut back these days, why doesn’t the Township.”
The purpose of the Clearview meeting was for Council and staff to take public input on the proposed property tax increase of 4.5 per cent for 2012. The Treasurer and staff put a good effort into presenting more than enough information for those in attendance to ask questions about.
Once in the Q & A session, too much time was taken by Councillors and staff in defending the proposed budget and not enough in listening to the concerns. At times, answers devolved into long detailed lectures, sounding more like “we know best” than “your feedback is very important to us.”
Don’t get me wrong, Council and staff put a lot of work into this budget and a certain amount of explanation as to how we arrived at the 4.5% tax increase was necessary. But I think the public was right to question the many areas they did and I would have liked to have heard more.
We need to pay more attention to why our operating costs are rising and where we can achieve efficiencies. We need to better understand the real service benefits of planned capital programs to our residents and whether and when we can afford them.
By my count only 10 of the 85-plus people who attended actually asked a question, some more than once. They were important questions such as the future of the Stayner library and its value to the community. Some questioned if we took into account the ability of taxpayers to pay rising taxes, especially those young families on limited budgets and seniors on fixed incomes. Growth was a much discussed topic, the most pressing aspect being its potential upward pressure for even more tax revenue. When the need for increased services was given as a rationale for more growth and more tax revenue, one resident commented, “The point is, we don’t want these new services.”
Several questioned the size and cost of the current Township organization and asked why efficiencies could not be found as in all other levels of government. The example of the extremely high cost of policing was an area mentioned several times. Township employee salaries were raised as another that needed to be looked before this budget is approved.
The increasing long-term indebtedness of the Township was another concern mentioned several times.
These were important questions and we as a Council need to pay attention to them. Despite our efforts to complete a multi-year budget and a long term financial outlook, this work remains incomplete. However, preliminary work points to average property tax increases in the range of 5 per cent over the next five years, unless we find ways to hold these increases down. This is too high a burden to ask our homeowners to bear.
To my colleagues who think our taxpayers’ place is best in the ballot box every four years and who are frustrated when residents assert their right to participate individually or in numbers, I urge you to listen to what our residents are saying. The public has a place at the decision table.
If we don’t, we risk losing those residents who can no longer afford to live in Clearview and making our Township a less attractive place to move to.