Collecting overdue taxes
	Do higher property assessments mean higher tax bills?

Value for money: how property taxes are spent

• Toronto is considered to have one of the highest qualities of life of any city in North America. Maintaining quality of life means having good public services. Those services are funded by property taxes and user fees.



• The City's share of revenues from each tax dollar paid out by citizens of the city is less than five per cent. The province and the federal government receive the other 95 per cent.



• The City of Toronto funds dozens of vital services, including: water and sewage, public transit, planning new community developments and enhancing existing neighbourhoods, maintenance of the local road network, snow removal, library services, police services, fire services and emergency medical services (ambulance), public health, child care, animal control and by-law enforcement, parks and recreation, arts and culture, long-term care and senior housing, economic development, storm sewers, social services, social housing, garbage collection and recycling, the TTC and the Toronto Zoo.



• The Toronto property tax dollar and user fees help maintain 6200 kilometres of roads, 1,500 parks, 28,000 housing units, 46,000 kilometres of watermains, 10,000 kilometres of sewers, 10,300 streets, and 400 bridges.



• Forty-five thousand people serve Toronto residents through City departments, boards, agencies and commissions at 2600 municipal locations, including district service centres, ambulance, fire and police stations, libraries, recreation facilities, Toronto Transit Commission and rapid transit stations, cultural centres and historical museums.



• Not only do municipal services have a regular and direct effect on daily life, municipal service delivery ranks higher in overall quality than provincial and federal service delivery (Citizens First, Canadian Centre for Management Development).



• Property taxes go beyond the delivery of essential services to provide the means to support economic development, social development and urban development priorities of the City that help shape the quality of life in the community.



• For example, economic development activity helps position:
  • Toronto as Canada's "corporate capital", with more nationally and internationally top-ranked companies than any other Canadian City
  • Toronto as the nation's largest employment centre, with one sixth of Canada's jobs and strong employment in both manufacturing and financial services
  • Toronto as "Silicon Valley North" with seven of the top ten information technology companies, including the headquarters and research centres for Apple, Hewlett-Packard and Sun Microsystems
  • Toronto as having one of the best telecommunication networks in the world, and among the highest in percentage of fibre optic cable use
  • Toronto as home to the 4th highest concentration of commercial software companies in the world and one of North America's top animation centres
  • Toronto as home to North America's second largest Stock Exchange
  • Toronto as the generator of as much as $125 billion (1998) to the GDP of Canada



• Cities have become centres of the new global economy. Infrastructure must be in good repair, supporting a quality of life that is competitive with the rest of the world. Quality of life has now become a key determinant in attracting investment from around the world (Fortune magazine). Quality of life depends on excellent public service and service delivery.



• Toronto is a magnet drawing new immigrants to the opportunities inherent in Canada's largest city. Over the years, waves of immigrants have contributed to the social and economic fabric of the city and continue to distinguish Toronto as one of the most diverse, multicultural cities in the world. Today, municipal tax dollars continue to fund numerous programs aimed at supporting a productive transition from immigrant to citizen.



• It is the position of the Association of Municipalities of Ontario and the Federation of Canadian Municipalities that the property tax base is being asked to do more than it can. New sustainable revenue sources are required, if the quality of life in Canada's major cities is to be maintained and, thus, attractive to investment.



• The increasing role of the property tax in meeting municipal needs is most dramatic in Ontario. The contribution of property taxes to municipal revenues has risen by more than 33 per cent in Ontario in the last ten years. It has risen about 6 per cent in the rest of Canada.