The organization of B.C.’s local elected leaders has laid out a plan to the province for how it would like the senior level of government to shore up the finances of towns and cities to pay for escalating costs around housing, public safety and a changing climate.
More than 2,200 municipal leaders, mayors and councillors from B.C.’s cities and towns are in Vancouver this week for the Union of B.C. Municipalities (UBCM) annual convention.
It comes just a month before voters in the province head to the polls to elect a provincial government. The race is expected to be tight between David Eby’s B.C. NDP and John Rustad’s B.C. Conservative Party.
Those at the convention hope the close race will mean extra attention and commitments made by party leaders — who will address the convention later this week — to the troubles cities, towns and First Nations are facing.
“We’re dealing with more social issues. We’re dealing with more housing issues. We’re dealing with natural disasters, you know, the list goes on and on,” said Princeton Mayor Spencer Coyne.
His town of 3,000 residents needs to raise $84 million for flood mitigation as it continues to recover from serious flooding in 2021 and has, so far, struck out on help from the federal government.
In a report coinciding with this year’s conference, called Stretched to the Limit, the UBCM argues local governments are providing more and more public services in areas of provincial responsibility, such as housing, without a corresponding growth in revenue.
It details municipalities struggling to meet residents’ unmet mental health needs and cope with social disorder but also keep up with demands from the province to provide more housing faster as well as respond to climate emergencies such as flooding or excessive heat.
“There is currently an over-reliance on the property tax system that never contemplated funding service delivery and infrastructure gaps linked to provincial mandates,” says the report.
UBCM has released our priorities for the provincial election. Gaps in provincial services, increasing regulatory requirements and emergency management costs are stretching local budgets. UBCM is calling on all parties to address these gaps. #bcpoli pic.twitter.com/xni8zmqdsH
The UBCM is calling for the next provincial government to address pressures through new provincial transfers to local governments.
The first is transferring a percentage of the provincial property transfer tax to support local efforts in subsidizing affordable housing supply and homelessness responses.
UBCM also wants the province to provide an additional $650 million in infrastructure funding annually for local capital and operating infrastructure projects.
And it wants the province to transfer an annual percentage of the growth in the provincial carbon tax to support local climate action projects and emergency management planning and responses.
UBCM says it hasn’t been specific about what percentages it wants, considering many communities are beginning to count costs over housing and homelessness.
It wants a more accurate accounting before settling on a figure, it said.
Meanwhile, for emergency management, it said even one per cent of the carbon tax increase would effectively double the funding transferred to communities for climate-change related projects.
“The ask here is modest on an annual basis, but the key is a long-term commitment,” said a UBCM official in an email to CBC News.
It’s a tricky ask, however, considering the provincial government is swimming in red ink, with the current fiscal deficit sitting at $9 billion.
Help from the carbon tax is also in limbo as the current premier, David Eby, says he would eliminate the 16-year-old tax if Ottawa got rid of laws requiring it. It’s a promise John Rustad has made as well.
Municipal leaders at the UBCM conference say the money must come from somewhere as long as it’s not local taxpayers.
“We are definitely stretched to the limit,” said City of Coquitlam Coun. Trish Mandewo who is also the president of the UBCM.
Nanaimo Mayor Leonard Krog, New Westminster Mayor Patrick Johnstone and Abbotsford Mayor Ross Siemens are all attending the Union of B.C. Municipalities meeting in Vancouver this week. They spoke to the CBC about issues like involuntary care and what resolutions they hope to get support for at the annual municipalities’ conference.
