For Immediate Release
May 17, 2018
Mississauga Matters!
As the 3rd largest city in Ontario with a population approaching 800,000, Mississauga is quickly becoming a city in demand. At the same time, we continue to face growing challenges and pressures to deliver services to our residents, the same people we all serve.
Like all 444 municipalities in Ontario, Mississauga needs a committed and cooperative partner at Queen’s Park to help us address our challenges. As you know, municipalities like Mississauga can only collect property taxes and user fees to deliver the services residents expect.
In Mississauga, we deliver over 332 services, from snow plowing and leaf pick-up; to libraries and community centre programming; to road maintenance and transit service. As a City, we are the closest to the people and see first-hand the effects of funding decisions made by the province.
We cannot cut our way to prosperity.
Mississauga needs the provincial government to partner with us to make investments to build more housing that is affordable for middle-income residents so that people can live and work in Mississauga.
We need the provincial government to continue to make investments in our local infrastructure to help us build community centres, roads, bridges, parks, trails, bike lanes and everything else that makes Mississauga a great place to live.
Mississauga needs a provincial partner to make significant investments in our local and regional transit systems – like GO Transit and the Hurontario LRT – to allow us to break gridlock and congestion and get people and businesses moving.
And, we need a provincial government that consults before making changes to legislation that will have a significant impact on residential and commercial tax bills.
Attached is a questionnaire. I would appreciate you taking the time to answer questions about how you would work with Mississauga, should you and your party form government on June 7th.
Sincerely,
Bonnie Crombie
Mayor, City of Mississauga
The City of Mississauga seeks responses to the following questions that align with Mississauga’s priority issues. Please answer the following three questions in no more than 250 words per question. Answers will be posted publicly at www.mississaugamatters.org
Connected, Seamless, Rapid Public Transit
- Will you and your party fully commit to maintaining the $1.4 billion that has already been committed to build the Hurontario LRT?
- Will you commit to increasing train service on the Milton GO corridor, including all-day, two-way service?
- The doubling of the Provincial Gas Tax by 2022 has been committed to by the current government. Does your party support this commitment and to developing other revenue sharing programs like the Gas Tax to provide municipalities with the funding and tools to build transit.
Sustainable Infrastructure
- Do you commit to developing long-term, predictable, and sustainable funding programs from the provincial government to specifically fund the building and maintenance of municipal infrastructure?
- Will you commit to working with municipalities like Mississauga to develop new revenue tools to help us fund our capital infrastructure needs and provide us with greater autonomy to make our own decisions?
Affordable, Middle-Class Housing
- Does your party commit to working with the City of Mississauga to provide us with the tools and funding we need to incentivize the building of affordable, middle-class housing?
Legislative Changes
- Legislation passed by the provincial government often has an impact on municipal budgets. In particular, does your party commit to reviewing legislation related to interest arbitration and joint and several liability, as well as to reviewing the Greater Toronto Airports Authority (GTAA) Payment in Lieu of Taxes (PILTs) formula, along with other legislation that places an undue financial burden on municipalities?