People have their say on 2019 city budget
Speakers call for more spending on affordable housing, rent supplements, shelters at public meeting
Citizens said they want more affordable housing and emergency shelter services to help homeless people at special meeting on the 2019 city budget at City Hall on Wednesday night.
Councillors had invited people to come tell them what they want included in the municipal budget for 2019.
It’s early to discuss it: councillors won’t hammer out a budget until January (after the municipal election in October).
But they’ve already asked city staff to propose a tax increase to pay for all city services and capital projects that council has in mind, for 2019.
Staff has proposed a tax hike of 2.5 per cent next year.
For the average homeowner with a house with a house assessed at $251,700, a tax increase of 2.5 per cent would add $98 to the tax bill (bringing that bill up to a total of $4,035.91).
On Wednesday, five people spoke to councillors in the hour-long meeting: four of them spoke passionately about how more affordable housing and shelter services are desperately needed in the city.
A fifth citizen, Marie Bongard, told councillors she was concerned about the rise of gambling addiction due to the opening of the new casino in Peterborough and she wanted to see further spending on addiction services.
Others were squarely focused on homelessness prevention.
Dr. Michelle Fraser, a local family doctor, asked councillors to consider funding more emergency shelter beds for women, non-binary and trans people.
She was speaking to councillors on behalf of Peterborough Healthcare Providers Against Poverty.
Fraser noted that there’s only one shelter in the city meant exclusively for women and it only has 10 beds.
“They (the beds) are always fully occupied – always,” she said.
She also noted that emergency shelters in the city are only open overnight, leaving some of her patients with no place to go during the day.
It means those who have diabetes have no place to store their insulin, she said, or patients with respiratory infections have no place to rest and heal during the day.
She also asked councillors to consider increasing rent supplements or rentgeared-to-income programs so people can be housed.
“I believe that without housing, optimal health is impossible,” she said.
Joanne Bezak-Brokking also made a passionate plea for more money for rent supplements.
She spoke to council about the Peterborough Poverty Reduction Network.
“The community is saying that housing needs to be a spending priority for 2019,” she told councillors.
Paul Armstrong had a practical suggestion: he asked councillors to set up a $100,000 emergency fund to help people in imminent danger of eviction.
The money could give rent supplements out to 40 people per year, he said – and save them from homelessness.
He said the idea would be to use as much money as needed from the fund each year, depending on how many people are in dire need – then top it up to $100,000 yearly.
Armstrong didn’t think it was a lot to ask.
“I’m not here to ask for copious amounts of money to alleviate the problem,” he said.
Meanwhile, Jason Wallwork asked councillors to spend more.
He asked councillors to consider putting aside 25 per cent of the $4 million the city is expected as part of a revenue-sharing agreement with the new casino, in 2019, for use as rent supplements.
And if the city does sell Peterborough Distribution Inc. (PDI) as planned – PDI was expected to be sold to Hydro One, putting roughly $51 million in city coffers – then Wallwork wants to see half that money go toward building affordable housing.
It’s unclear whether a PDI deal is forthcoming; Hydro One announced in March it had walked away from talks to purchase the distribution company, but the two sides have continued talking.
Still, Wallwork asked councillors to consider using any proceeds to end homelessness.
“It seems like a big spend,” he said, but then asked councillors if it’s really such an extravagant request to help the city’s most vulnerable.
Councillors weren’t expected to debate or make decisions on Wednesday – they were simply hearing citizens’ concerns.
The next time citizens can speak to councillors about the 2019 budget will be on Jan. 9, just as budget talks begin.