Mayor John Tory is offering Premier Doug Ford “a path forward” to end their feud over major funding cuts poised to hit Toronto public health, child care and transit services.But Tory’s offer — to scour city finances with provincial and possibly private-sector help — hinges on the penny-pinching being saved for next year’s budget, with Ford halting this year’s estimated $178-million funding clawback.The mayor notes city council’s vote last week asking Ford to cancel cuts, most of them retroactive to April 1 — after Toronto and other blindsided municipalities had approved 2019 budgets with spending plans and tax bills.“The city manager has been clear that these cuts create a $177.65-million hole in our already-approved 2019 budget,” Tory wrote in a letter sent to Ford on Monday. “He was also clear that we will not be able to make up this difference with efficiencies alone this far into the fiscal year — if your government proceeds with these cuts, the city will be forced to cut core services or raise taxes.”City staff peer at every budget line and find savings every year, Tory said, but “to find a higher magnitude of efficiencies than ever before, halfway through the year … It simply defies logic to suggest this is possible.”The mayor invites the province to help find savings for 2020 that don’t affect the city’s core services. “We are willing to work with you to find ways to do things better and to save money, but we need time and real dialogue and co-operation to allow us to do so,” he writes.Read more: Opinion | Martin Regg Cohn: Doug Ford’s post-budget plan to declare bankruptcyOntario’s municipalities grapple with hundreds of millions in provincial funding cutsToronto District School Board releases list of cancelled high school classesNews of the unprecedented retroactive cuts, affecting all Ontario municipalities but hitti ...
|
