Mayors revive funding pleas
Pressure on to find transit project cash
Nearly a year after the public killed a proposed sales tax to fund transportation in Metro Vancouver, the region’s mayors are making a renewed pitch to use the carbon tax or a vehicle levy to underwrite their $7.5-billion plan.
Mayors say the funding sources are among suggestions in a plan sent to TransLink Minister Peter Fassbender, who has been asked to either approve them or come up with alternatives to help pay for projects including more buses and rapid transit expansions in Surrey and Vancouver. Surrey Mayor Linda Hepner also said earlier this month that mayors are looking at ways to capture development cost charges around SkyTrain stations.
The pressure comes as the regional mayors’ council seeks to cash in on money from the federal government, which has offered to provide 50 per cent of funding for transportation projects if the province and TransLink cover the rest. The province has typically provided a third of funding for capital projects.
That means TransLink and the regional mayors would have to come up with 17 per cent to cover their share of the projects’ cost.
Currently, TransLink can only increase gasoline taxes, property taxes and fares to generate more money for transit.
Mayors have refused to raise property taxes any further, saying homeowners are already being squeezed to provide other municipal services.
“Time has become crunch critical. We have to be in a solid position to be in line for that funding,” Hepner said, referring to tapping into the federal dollars. “We need to come up with other avenues available to us.”
The push for new funding sources comes nearly a year after a transportation plebiscite, in which the public rejected a proposed regional sales tax of 0.5 per cent, expected to yield about $250 million annually. In 2013, the mayors’ council had also said an annual vehicle registration fee, based on vehicle emis- sions or engine size, could reap $50 million, while a $5-a-tonne regional carbon tax could potentially generate $90 million a year.
A technical analysis also suggested land capture — leveraging the value of lands around SkyTrain station development — would generate about $30 million annually. Earlier this month, Hepner and Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson acknowledged the mayors are investigating development cost charges as a way to generate revenue around the high-density development that is typically allowed near transit hubs.
Burnaby Mayor Derek Corrigan said the mayors are pitching the same sources, such as the carbon tax, because they “are trying to advance a realistic idea of what options are available for funding.”
“They’re still pushing to see if there is any appetite for that from the provincial government,” he said.
“All of the mayors have a belief there should be synergy between the carbon tax and transportation. It’s the option, I think, that’s most attractive to people wanting to improve transportation.”
However, the province has consistently refused to allow the carbon tax to be used for transportation, saying it is carbon neutral. Successive governments have also rejected a vehicle levy, even though it has long been allowed in B.C. law. Premier Christy Clark deflected the mayors’ requests last time by calling for a transportation plebiscite.
“We’re at an impasse because the province always says ‘there’s the property tax,’ ” Corrigan said. “Do I think this is going to break the impasse? No. But the mayors want to take every opportunity they can to take another kick at the can.”
The proposed funding would be used to pay for projects in the short term, while mayors consider mobility pricing — tolling all bridges or charging drivers a fee per distance travelled — as a longer-term funding solution. Fassbender is expected to respond to the mayors’ proposal within 10 days.
Meanwhile, Delta Mayor Lois Jackson said she has become disillusioned with the mayors’ council. She said she suggested the mayors’ council charge a $1 toll on every bridge, but that was shot down, while none of the other mayors are supporting plans for a new Massey bridge to replace the tunnel.