words of wisdom from him......
Dear Friends,
Here is a summary of my remarks today regarding the Land Transfer Tax and other important matters:
Check Against Delivery
It's no secret, the Land Transfer Tax works against our City's long term economic interests.
The Land Transfer Tax makes Toronto less competitive and makes it more difficult to buy a home in our great city.
This tax unfairly targets seniors and growing families.
Toronto has the highest Land Transfer Tax in Canada.
We are the only City in Ontario that hits homebuyers with a Municipal Land Transfer Tax on top of the Provincial one.
Today, if you are looking to buy a detached home in Toronto, you can expect to pay around $25,000 in Land Transfer Taxes.
That's thousands of dollars new homeowners would otherwise be putting into our economy.
Money, that would we be used for renovations on their home, or buying new furniture.
My office has been inundated with calls and emails from residents who support cutting the Land Transfer Tax.
I campaigned on eliminating the Land Transfer Tax and I am committed to phasing it out.
But, we cannot escape the political reality at City Hall: Unfortunately, most Councillors want to keep this unfair tax– and keep spending the millions it brings in.
Personally, I would rather see those millions being spent by our residents, stimulating our economy and creating jobs.
That is why, the Budget Chief will be bringing forward a motion to reduce the Land Transfer Tax by 5%.
This will make life a little easier for seniors looking to downsize their home and growing families.
This is a small step in the right direction, a step I know we can take this year.
There are those who will say this cannot be done. The reality is, it has only been a few weeks since City Council took my budget and my powers, and councillors are already going back to the old ways.
I am extremely disappointed that the mentality at City Hall hasn’t changed. Tax, tax, tax. Spend, spend, spend.
We have already demonstrated that in every division there are major efficiencies to be found.
In four budgets we have found over 800 million dollars in savings.
Under my leadership, the City of Toronto is doing more with less.
As we are driving efficiencies and savings, we are also investing billions of dollars in Toronto's hard infrastructure.
We are putting money into our roads, bridges, sidewalks and expressways.
I will be working closely with the Budget Chief and the General Manager of the Parks and Recreation to bring the first outdoor ice skating rink to Scarborough in 2014.
We are also hiring 300 police officers in 2014.
I want to thank our frontline officers for the work they do every day to keep our streets safe and free of crime.
Folks, we are doing all of this, while keeping taxes as low as possible.
My administration has shown that we do not need massive tax increases year after year.
I believe that if the political will still existed, we could easily bring in a 1.75% tax increase for Toronto taxpayers in 2014.
We are only 18 million dollars away from this goal.
I find it hard to believe that 44 members of Toronto City Council can't find 18 million dollars in a budget of over 12 billion dollars.
That’s our job; it's what taxpayers elected us to do.
