Don't Worry, Be Happy

That seems to be the message coming out of city hall because they seem incapable of recognizing that you improve your fiscal health by watching the nickels and dimes. I was watching Goldhawk live a couple of weeks and ago and Case Oates put forward a suggestion to cut costs and Sandra Bussins response was "it will only save about $10 million." Only $10 million....... City budget full of fiscal humps

By SUE-ANN LEVY, TORONTO SUN

Last week the city began refurbishing the phalanx of speed humps on Merton St. between Mt. Pleasant Rd. and Bayview Ave.

A resident in the area contacted me wondering why they were doing work on them at all, especially since the humps had been there for nearly 10 years and the city was in a fiscal crisis.

Gary Welsh, the city's general manager of transportation, told me they're being redone because they were "a bit too high" and cars "are bottoming out."

He said speed humps -- which cost $3,000 a pop -- are "very difficult to install" and if they don't get the height exactly the way they should be, the humps can end up being a "touch high." Setting aside the obvious question of how a city can even dream of engaging in such an effort in a time of fiscal restraint, I'm frankly stumped by this whole hump business.

As a report from the federal CMHC has recently shown, speed humps and other traffic calming measures "increase automobile emissions and reduce air quality" -- the exact opposite effect of what the mayor and his minions intend to achieve with their trendy green initiatives.

True, just $448,000 has been allocated to traffic calming measures in 2008. Still the item is symbolic of the many capital programs that could easily be cut or deferred by a cash-strapped City Hall facing a debt load of $2.6 billion next year plus nearly $500 million in debt service charges and no commitment from the federal and provincial governments to provide any of the funding the city expects for transit.

If one thing can be said about next year's $1.5-billion capital budget, it truly is a dog's breakfast which fails miserably to address the key problems facing the city's infrastructure -- that is, to keep pace with the hundreds of millions of dollars of backlogged repairs sorely needed by the city's decaying roads, bridges, libraries, community centres and shabby parks.

If I ruled City Hall, which I do not, I'd use the limited capital dollars I do have to take care of the basics. I'd make darn sure the city's billions of dollars in assets were maintained properly before the infrastructure crumbled to the point of costly replacement.

I suspect many Toronto residents would agree with that pragmatic approach. But it should come as no surprise that the Millerites have chosen a different path -- that is to take precious reserves, and in some cases to raise the city's debt beyond affordable limits, to fund a plethora of climate change and clean air initiatives and other socialist pet projects, including special treatment for the mayor's 13 priority at-risk neighbourhoods.

Despite all the mayor's talk about improving transit to get people out of their cars, TTC general secretary Vince Rodo said for the most part the more than $400 million designated for transit projects next year are "largely just replacing your asset at the end of its life with a new one ... as a general rule (they're) state-of-good-repair."

The city's own documents (a mass of paper and figures designed deliberately, in my view, to confuse even a professional number-cruncher) say that even with the $30-million allocated to the parks and recreation repair backlog next year, it will grow to $232 million in 2008 and swell to $324 million by 2012. Yet more than $3 million will be plunked into new soccer fields, sports complexes, playground equipment and youth lounges in a selection of the city's 13 priority neighbourhoods.

The documents also note that the city's 102 library buildings have a $16.9-million maintenance backlog which is projected to increase to $30 million by 2012. That notwithstanding, city officials have found $6.4 million next year to expand or renovate five libraries in the mayor's priority neighbourhoods. According to the documents, this will "contribute further in promoting multi-ethnic culture, literacy and job skills."

The transportation budget is another disaster. Although $135 million will be spent to repair the roads next year, the current $310-million backlog will grow to $415 million by 2012.

Yet the city's documents proudly contend that the transportation capital plan supports the city's (i.e., the mayor's) strategic priorities such as "A Wonderful Waterfront City", "A Creative City" and "A Greener City." What that means is that $1.5 million will be set aside to plant 800 trees and $5.5 million of precious capital dollars to will go to Toronto Bike Plan projects.

ST. CLAIR PROJECT

Another $8 million will be poured into the never-ending St. Clair right-of-way project, bringing the total cost to $78 million, give or take a "few million," says Transportation GM Welsh.

But the very best funding decisions (I say that completely tongue in cheek) come under a category called Sustainable Energy Plan.

In that section we learn that nearly $100 million has been set aside over the next five years -- starting with $21.4 million next year -- to fund energy retrofit projects in city buildings, a Toronto Energy Conservation Fund (a slush fund that will provide grants to schools and hospitals for retrofits), a City of Toronto Green Fund (another slush fund for renewable energy technology), upgrades to make City Hall "an energy sustainability showcase" and more Deep Lake Water cooling projects (over and above the $100 million the city has already invested in this Enwave scheme with no documented payback to date.) Deputy mayor Joe Pantalone, president of the board of governors of Exhibition Place, will also get $11.4 million for various green initiatives even though Exhibition Place has a backlog of $7 million in unmet repairs, a figure which is scheduled to rise to $44 million by 2012.

The capital budget will be considered by the mayor's executive committee on Nov. 26 and by council on Dec. 11 -- although I'm betting the funding priorities won't change much.

Don't worry. Be happy. At Socialist City Hall, it's looking like it will be a green Christmas. Just drink, be merry and try to forget that our city is crumbling all around us!