Seeking a Just Budget in Hamilton 2004
Presentation to Committee of the Whole by Murray Lumley
February 17, 2004

Judeo-Christian ethics of justice and mercy as well as all world religions say that a civilization will not thrive unless it takes care of of its most vulnerable – the widows and orphans of Bible language or the poor of today.

A budget is a description of a community – where it directs its resources, where its priorities lie. The budget can be a just, caring and merciful budget if it allocates community resources to all in need in an open, democratic fashion. Or those who make the decisions, can be so influenced by powerful interests that they direct the needed resources to those who already have enough or even too much, leaving the powerless to scramble for crumbs. The first scenario describes the successful community.

Now I agree with the Mayor's and others' attempts such as Tom Cooper's campaign, to try to get the provincial government to initiate pooling from surrounding municipalities to help with Hamilton's social services costs. Pooling describes a just, merciful, caring community. It should be applied to all of our community endeavours and represents what the tax system is supposed to achieve – a measure of equality.

A recent SPRC report tells us that the HSR is an important factor for Hamilton's low income people who may need this service look for a job and for travelling to and from work. More than one fifth of Hamilton residents live below the poverty line and those on social assistance, many disabled, were cut 22% and haven't received a raise in nine years. Instead of increasing fares as is planned, it would be just and caring to lower them or even eliminate them all together. Maybe a tax placed on all cars that drive into the city would be a good idea. This falls into the category of a "tax on those things that harm"  – an idea proposed and put into practice by the Lord Mayor of London. Mayor Glen Murray of Winnipeg has proposed other taxes in this vein. The result would certainly be massive complaints from drivers, but imagine the increase in ridership – HSR data says that increased fares reduce ridership so why not the reverse. More buses would need to be purchased; more routes and pickups would be added. New ideas would be stimulated, like light rail. Cleaner air would be a consequence and demand for more roads would end as people filled buses instead of packing highways with their cars. The environment would improve and there would be less demand for sprawl. Justice and caring for the earth would result.

I also agree with Councillor Braden and others in the community like economist Tom Muir who wrote an article in the February 7 Spectator that indicated that the BTR and the Red Hill Expressway Project are not and will not bring a sufficient return to pay for themselves let alone get Hamilton out of its debt crisis anytime soon. Our community cannot afford these expenses and the debt charges they are producing. Despite the BTR, industries have left Hamilton due to international pressures that have nothing to do with our attractiveness as a community. The only beneficiaries of the Expressway, Muir says, are the developers and construction companies that look forward to the profitable residential subdivisions in Glanbrook – looking less likely to be the originally planned expensive to service industrial parkland. And the only jobs described in the Hemson report on Economic benefits of the expressway, are the construction jobs of the expressway and homebuilding.  Muir says that "greenfield residential development provides no net return to the city, but costs more than its taxes."  And he says, "developer profits cannot deliver a balanced budget at city hall." Hamilton's own budget document warns that because of planned capital expenditures like the Red Hill project, needed infrastructure repairs are unaffordable. And the Mayor's public budget meetings which have asked residents to make choices about tax increases, service cuts and fee increases which will harm the most vulnerable, has not presented all of the options. For instance, while Hamilton is asking the province for "pooling" for social services, it is receiving $122 million over the next few years as the province's share of the expressway.

I think you would agree that if the above scenario is true it does not represent a just, caring budget where all benefit rather than a privileged few who use the levers of power and influence to seize what they want.

I certainly do not have all the answers, but I think the people in our community do. We do have huge economic, social and environmental problems. There needs to be a truly open discussion in our community with no facts held back. Right now we need to work with and care for the workers who may lose jobs and pensions at Stelco and other at-risk industries.

I ask the Mayor and Council members to re-examine our priorities so that a just, caring budget is the result. A good start would be to negotiate with the province to cancel the expressway and ask for the province's contribution of $122 million to be diverted to our services and transit needs.

Last November Hamilton saw an Anglican priest lead a flock of people through the Red Hill Valley and submit himself to arrest, in order to save the Creator's Earth. He was asking for a just, caring, merciful Hamilton. Please don't disappoint him or us.

Murray D. Lumley, Ancaster