None of us enjoy paying taxes of any kind, property, and city taxes especially.
Few of us appreciate exactly how much we get in return for that money. We need roads repaired, garbage collected, water and sewer systems working. We need a fire department, a police force, clean air, good medical facilities, parks and recreation, arts and entertainment, there are numerous benefits for the taxpayers, but we all want different things.
The current city councillors are under considerable pressure to keep taxes low; this is the case with every council.
To me one of the biggest mistakes of the past was working too hard to lower the taxes. I recall one year that council even dipped into our reserve fund to lower the tax rate. It did satisfy the citizenship of the day, but in the long term it has caught up with us and now today's citizens must bear the extra cost.
Lowering city taxes, cutting back excess expenditure is important when it can be done, but long-term planning, city growth and expansion cannot be ignored in the process.
Today council has a few smart newcomers who can think outside of the box. They recognize the importance of long-term planning, that it is vital, that city services cannot be restricted to a four-year term, but an ongoing one.
Setting priorities is not easy, long-term priorities even more difficult as they change overtime. Planning for unexpected costs such as we had during the pandemic caught us all by surprise, even though scientists had warned us for years of the possibility of something like that happening, telling us that we should have anticipated it.
Councillors can never keep all their electorate happy as we all have different priorities, wants and needs. It’s easy for us to judge their decisions, yet not give them credit for giving their time to improve our lives. It often seems some of the loudest complainers never even took the time to vote.
Throughout my years in Cambridge, I have been asked to run for various political posts. It has never been a job I even considered, dealing with negativity, rarely being complimented. Its a tough, time-consuming job with little appreciation, lots of negativity and sometimes abusive language, with too few rewards.
Council is trying to accomplish the greatest good for the greatest number of people; for every one of us who thinks they got it right, there will be an equal number who disagree.
My suggestion is taking a good look at what your taxes cover, a broad range of services to make our lives better. I would ask those who disagree not what is wrong but how would you correct the problem? What could you do better?
There is no easy solution. The task is left to those we elected. They welcome positive feedback, but negative abusive comments that might make some individuals feel better temporarily, do nothing to advance the cause in the long run.
Maybe the next tax bill could include a flyer inserted with the bill listing all those items our taxes go toward, an explanation of what our money covers.
Taxes to many have become unmanageable, the result of years of cutting them back have made it worse. Playing catch up with city infrastructure is now more costly than it would have been at the time and putting it off even longer would increase the cost.
Setting priorities is difficult and frequently we do not understand the history that has led to this. Many of us do not know which are municipal responsibilities and which are provincial and federal. My priorities for spending of tax dollars are probably different than yours.
Council has the unfortunate task of coming to a consensus to attempt to please as many of us as possible, for the lowest cost, while being responsible to maintain our city services.
I do not envy anyone this task, but I do appreciate their efforts and I do appreciate that my taxes pay for a lot of things I need.
At this time of year, I’m just thankful I never accepted a political role. Good luck councillors and city staff as you do you best to satisfy our needs.
