Ottawa Mayor Mark Sutcliffe says the city is facing a 'financial crisis' that raises the spectre of tax hikes and service cuts, alleging the city has been treated unfairly on issues of taxes and transit by the federal and provincial governments.
Ottawa Mayor Mark Sutcliffe says the city is facing a"financial crisis" that raises the spectre of tax hikes and service cuts, alleging the city has been treated unfairly on issues of taxes and transit by the federal and provincial governments.He said Ottawa has received a fraction of the Greater Toronto Area's transit support and suggested the federal government owed millions of dollars in back taxes.
He alleged the federal government has shortchanged the city of $100 million over the past five years on payments in lieu of property taxes on its buildings, which are exempt from local taxation. While the province has paid capital costs of major Toronto transit projects, he said Ottawa has ended up paying for more than half of the capital costs of the second phase of the city's LRT project once cost overruns are accounted for.
"It's time for the federal and provincial governments to recognize the scope of the crisis in our city and to recognize we didn't create this mess," Sutcliffe said.Sutcliffe said the"number 1 reason" for Ottawa's transit woes is lost ridership from federal public servants who work less from the office than they did pre-pandemic, noting it could take decades for the city to catch up to ridership forecasts that underpin recent system expansion.
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