The Canadian Taxpayers Federation has set up a petition and is calling on Torontonians to flood the Mayor’s office with phone calls to protest the land transfer tax hike and the additional vehicle registration tax. City Council is set to vote on these new taxes on Monday. Twenty-two Councillors are for it, 20 are against, two are unknown, and four “yeses” may switch to “nos.”

With such a close call, it’s worth it to protest as citizens may — just may — sway the vote. If you want to e-mail your Councillor directly, you’ll find them and their information here, and if you don’t know who your Councillor is, find that info here.

I’m seriously concerned about the proposed doubling of the land transfer tax more than the vehicle registration tax, but both pose a danger to the health of this city. This tax will halt all real estate transactions along the border of Toronto. Potential home buyers will take one look at the land transfer tax and they’ll look north, east, or west a few blocks to buy a similar house in the 905 region, one which probably has saner garbage policies too, in order to pay half the tax. Councillors don’t seem to get that even an extra two thousand dollars is a substantial amount, no matter what the ticket price of the home is. Most people understand that every dollar counts. Councillors must be swimming in so much of it that they don’t care and think the rest of us don’t either. Besides which we never seem to boot them out, no matter how ticked we are, and so they feel pretty safe.

As I was saying, the slowdown in the border areas will start a cascading effect into the rest of the city as people follow their neighbours out to the 905, deciding that Toronto is not the place to buy a home. The Mayor’s lame-ass amendment of exempting first-time home buyers isn’t going to make much difference since Toronto is often an upgrade destination. Those stagnant border areas will grow; then those living further into the centre of the city with money and ability to commute will move, especially after the first time they pay the new vehicle tax and then go home only to wrestle with the city’s ridiculous garbage requirements.

Businesses will follow. But even if businesses don’t move, the
reason this city works is because people live throughout the whole of it; the reason Detroit doesn’t work is because people live
outside it, except for the poor or those who have no choice.
Toronto will become Detroit of the north, and in the end,
Toronto will have gone from the possibility of being saved to lost. Meanwhile Councillors throw money around for the Mayor’s office, hunt down Rob Ford and Doug Holyday because they didn’t use their expense account, and hang onto their perks, thumbing their nose at the idea of symbolic leadership. People are noticing.

Related posts:

1. Wow, We Did It!
2. Musings on Taxes, Snow, and Garbage
3. Is There a Tax Revolt Brewing?
4. Mr Garbage: Bins Are More Esthetically Pleasing Than Sunny Porches, Flowers, and Lawns
5. The Latest Daft Idea from City Hall