Hunting city's pet projects |
There was a fiscal epiphany at City Hall this week.
I'm not suggesting Toronto's chief panhandler (a.k.a. Mayor David Miller) has finally recognized he should get his own house in order first before hitting up the city's citizens for more spare change to support his tax-and-spend regime.
It seems the finance officials have decided -- now that the amalgamated city is about to turn 10 years old -- it's time to develop a "comprehensive inventory" of city services and decide which ones are "core" to the municipal mandate.
Chief Financial Officer Joe Pennachetti and his director of financial planning Josie LaVita told their budget committee masters earlier this week that starting with the 2008 budget they'll conduct "value-added service planning."
In other words, they'll endeavour to determine which basic services the city really should be providing and which are considered discretionary -- or as I've often called them, frivolous pet projects designed to garner votes at election time.
To decide which are the city's core services, they'll develop a "core service definition tool" (not to be confused with the Miller revenue tools) and they'll put all services through a "core service filter" (not to be confused with a coffee filter).
"There is no definition out there (for a base service)," LaVita said, adding the city of Calgary hired consultants to determine their base services (I kid you not).
When all is said and done, they hope to shed or streamline discretionary services (er, pet projects) and save the cash-starved city some much-needed money.
I hate to make light of Pennachetti and LaVita's efforts because the two finance officials work incredibly hard. I suppose we should be relieved that after 10 years, they finally intend to review the city's vast array of services.
But just who are they kidding?
For all their talk about program efficiency and now service planning reviews, benchmarking and continuous improvement initiatives, the city should be a finely-oiled machine.
The truth is, in my nine years covering the goings-on at City Hall, I've never seen things in such a disastrous state. Nothing short of a monstrous Mad-Vac will sweep clean the wasteful practices, duplication and sheer arrogance of some city workers.
I can't help but wonder if this service planning review is a giant PR exercise to try to make the mayor look good on the eve of a council meeting at which his controversial City of Toronto Act taxes are expected to be passed -- although Pennachetti vehemently denied this yesterday.
As for getting a handle on the city's core services -- which I've proposed for years now -- it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that city officials should be focusing their limited resources on making sure they get garbage pickup right, that the parks are clean and inviting and citizens feel safe to walk in their neighbourhoods.
A cash-strapped city shouldn't be giving away $50-million to professional grant-getters or bailing out a debt-ridden theatre company to the tune of $1.2-million or spending millions on trendy climate change initiatives.
That said, I don't need "definition tools" or "service filters" to know that Miller and his socialists won't want to shed a single service, no matter how close the city is to going broke.
At that same meeting, Pennachetti made it clear the city's financial position is in rough shape as they head into 2008.
He said even if they keep to their debt targets, they'll add $1.2 billion in new debt over the next five years, bringing the city's total debt to $3.8 billion, a "significant" amount.
He told me yesterday the city's opening operating deficit pressures are "$605 million-ish" but that assumes the province will again be providing $100-million in transit assistance -- a commitment which has yet to be made.
It's interesting to note that all of the union contracts come up for renewal next April, a cost not factored into the deficit.
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