I have to agree with the statements made in this article by Megan MacInnis, who was appalled that the city would increase parking by some 31 per cent, and that her savings by switching to a cheaper lot, some $240 per year, have now disappeared.
Its these types of increases that the city implements without any regard to a persons ability to pay, that have to be changed. We have a culture at city hall that basically increases taxes and service fees under the guise of providing services to taxpayers, when in fact the ultimate beneficiaries of these increases are city management, inside and outside staff, police, fireman, etc. They are the ones that get yearly increases in salaries and benefits. We the taxpayers have to foot the bill, and are told that if taxes and services are not increased, then service would suffer.
It seems that the city has a one-track mind, and that is to solve all problems by increasing our taxes and service charges. They seem unable to grasp the concept of reducing costs, and operating in a more efficient manner.
To me, it is no coincidence that the city will be bringing in the Storm Water Utility Initiative at the same time that the one time (five year) tax on the Winter Games will expire. So in essence we will continue to pay approx. the same amount of money, only now it will go to storm water. The city on the other hand will get to keep the approx. $800,000 per annum that we presently pay in general taxes for storm water.
In addition, the city found out that they can now use money from the gas tax transfer for repairing roads. Is it a coincidence that they came to this revelation after they had spent more than $4 million of gas tax money on the Community Energy System?
The city constantly makes the statement that the present way of funding roads, snow, and now storm water, is unsustainable and these functions must be funded by specific utility taxes, along with a need to build up a reserve fund. The problem is all these machinations in the end only mean that our taxes are going up.
I strongly recommend that the taxpayers of Prince George fill out the Storm Water Utility Initiative Survey on the city website, and tell the city and our elected representatives, that we are not prepared to support another initiative that is nothing more than a thinly-disguised tax increase.
Eric Allen
Prince George
