Tax Petition is presented to council “oh well”   

Good morning and thank you for your time today.

The “Stop the 7​.​5% Burlington Property Tax Increase” petition has been presented to council. Twelve hundred and forty-seven people signed the petition asking for a zero percent tax increase. The multi-year forecast called for 8.9%, by asking for zero we were hoping to meet somewhere in the middle, at 4.4%, oh well.

I have to say I was surprised to see Burlington get out early again this year with the fictional “4.97%” overall tax increase.

It was interesting to watch Mr. Basit present a 4.97% on November 4th when the Halton Police budget had been made public on October 30th. Did Mr. Basit knowingly misrepresent the truth?

On November 18^th I listened to Leah Bortolotti talk about 6.7 million people visiting the website annually. I did another double-take. For a dose of reality, only 200,000 people live in Burlington. Are we expected to believe that every person in Burlington visits the website an average of 33 times a year? How many of these visits are to book the kids into a swim class? More confusing is that the budget document states on page 48 “our website—with its 1.5 million annual users”.

You have approved $148,000 for an SEO Marketing position. What is the payback?

Will there be a staff reduction in Service Burlington because people can find information themselves? Will there be KPIs to monitor this or is this just another overhead cost?

What residents need is information, not marketing spin, Google can make that information searchable. Adding a web marketing SEO position will slow down the posting of information making that information less accessible to taxpayers. Do you remember the taxpayers?  The people who pay for this.

The mayor talks about training bus drivers and then those drivers take jobs in other cities as a justification for higher pay. This statement is not supported by the 5.3% turnover number presented on November 4^th. A rate of 5.3% is lower than any private sector group except for heads of organizations and executives at 3.8%. This indicates the city has the right mix of salary, benefits and working conditions. An average, across-the-board, salary increase of 4.58% when inflation is 2.5% sounds high.

My theme today is clarity. Residents deserve factual information, clearly presented on the city’s website, by staff and the council, without the deft hand of a communications department spinning that information for the benefit of our elected representatives and city staff. I resent being taxed to pay for information to be marketed to me.

Looking ahead to 2026, what considerations are being made for a conservative Federal government and severe cuts to the housing accelerator fund? Much of the expected $21,000,000 may evaporate.

In terms of provincial funding, what happens if the city does not meet its housing targets and no provincial funds are available?

Burlington is building out community centers, transit, etc. for people who may or may not move into the community. What happens if the builders don’t build and the people don’t materialize? Is it time for more prudent cost controls?

The Burlington Residents’ Action Group submitted to this council, in writing, 14 pages of possible cost savings and economies of scale that the city could consider.

I’ve watched many council meetings, people who ask for money often receive money, and people who ask for cuts often receive nothing.

Why are lower tax increases important?

Lower increases leave people with more money for heat pumps and EVs.

Lower increases reduce renovictions by landlords who, through rent control, can only increase rents by 2.5%. This will reduce homelessness and help to “solve the crisis”.

Lower increases leave more money in people’s pockets, reducing food bank visits and crime, and lower the overall cost of policing.

I’ll conclude with, Your Worship, you win, for now, you hold all the cards, residents are not given enough time to review the budget, the budget does not include explanations for the programs, or what the return on the “investment” will be, and requests for details go unanswered. Congratulations on passing another huge budget increase without the community understanding what the percentage is or what the dollars are for!

What is happening with taxes in Burlington and why is the increase percentage so confusing?

The amount of revenue the city collects from Burlington property taxes will increase by 8.3% in 2025. New homes and condos, referred to as new assessments, will offset about .75% of this increase, leaving existing taxpayers with a 7.51% tax increase to line 1, the M-Municipal line on our tax bills. If the new assessment dollars don’t come in the way the city expects them to the “Tax Rate Stabilization” reserve fund will be used to make up for any shortfall.

Where does the 5.76% number come from?

If you look at the total tax bill, including taxes from Halton Region, Halton Police, and the Board of Education, our total tax bill will go up 5.76%. At this time, December 5th, 2024, the region has not voted on their increase so things may change.