Olivia Chow’s property tax plan might add up, but she needs to show us the math

With Olivia Chow the clear front-runner in the race to be Toronto’s next mayor, the spooky stories from her opponents about Chow and property taxes are starting to remind me of the kind of silly campfire tales I’d hear when I was a kid.

City councillor Brad Bradford keeps saying Chow will bring about a 20 per cent property tax increase that could force people to — avert your eyes, children — move to Hamilton.

Former councillor Ana Bailão at a debate last week suggested that a Chow victory would spell doom for a 90-year-old named Peggy, who could lose her home if property taxes go up.

And ex-police chief Mark Saunders has resorted to props, unveiling a novelty-sized property tax bill with a bunch of question marks next to a line marked “Olivia Chow’s huge tax increase.” He’s referred to Chow’s “mystery tax increases,” as if she’s an enigmatic supervillain.

For the record, all of this is fear-mongering nonsense.

Bradford’s claim about a 20 per cent tax increase is the kind of disingenuous political attack that should embarrass everyone involved. His campaign suggests, for example, that a Chow pledge to “significantly improve transit service” will mean an automatic and immediate five per cent increase, even though Chow has offered no such figure and it’s obviously possible to improve transit service for significantly less than that.

Another six per cent of Bradford’s dubious math is chalked up to “additional promises Olivia Chow is going to make between now and June 26.” In other words, a wild guess. Much of the rest of Bradford’s math relies on a bizarre assumption Chow would pay for long-term capital projects via the operating budget.

Meanwhile, Bailão’s concern about 90-year-old Peggy getting thrown out of her home is already addressed by a city program that shields seniors with low incomes from property tax increases.

And Saunders’s casting of Chow’s plan as a great mystery is belied by the fact that Chow has done a pretty good job of providing costing for her platform policies.

By my math, the pledges she’s made to date that will have an impact on your property tax bill are a 0.33 per cent increase to support her housing plan, a 0.3 per cent increase to expand the nonpolice program for people experiencing mental health crisis, and a 0.13 per cent increase to significantly expand library hours. Her pledge to reverse TTC service cuts hasn’t been costed, but estimates from transit expert Steve Munro peg that cost around $141 million, which works out to around 3.5 per cent.

So Chow’s promises might come out to around 4.25 per cent on top of inflation. Some of this — especially the transit service restoration — could be phased in over a couple of years, but even if not, on the average household that’s an impact of about $11.76 per month on the average property tax bill.

That doesn’t strike me as a particularly scary number. Especially since those most vulnerable to increases — low-income seniors and people with disabilities — won’t pay. And even with these kinds of increases, Toronto’s property tax bills will still be among the lowest in the GTA. They’d remain lower than Hamilton too.

It does frustrate me that I must do this math at all, though. I’ve said since before this campaign started that candidates should provide us with a fully costed budget. It doesn’t need to be written in stone — inflation rates will change, as will the level of federal and provincial support candidates can bank on — but giving us a look at your intended spending plan for 2024 is a reasonable expectation.

So far, only two candidates, former MPP Mitzie Hunter and policy analyst Chloe Brown, have offered anything close.

I get why Chow could be reluctant to join them. During her tenure at city hall in the 1990s and early 2000s, it was generally standard operating procedure for the mayor and council to first decide on the budget necessary to provide good municipal services. They’d then collaboratively figure out the property tax increase necessary to offset that budget.

After Rob Ford was elected mayor in 2010, however, the script was flipped. The tax rate was decided first, and the budget was pruned to fit. John Tory continued this practice during his tenure as mayor, despite protests from left-leaning councillors that it was a recipe for decline.

To use a road trip analogy, during Chow’s time on city council, city hall would figure out where they wanted to go then make sure they had enough gas money to get there. Ford, and later Tory, changed that, so the mayor would first figure out how much they wanted to spend on gas, then just drive until the tank ran out.

Chow’s desire to return to a more sensible approach is laudable, but I’m not sure it will do enough to defuse the fear-mongering from her opponents. To really douse their spooky silly campfire stories, she could be wise to offer voters just a little more math.

Matt Elliott is a Toronto-based freelance contributing columnist for the Star. Follow him on Twitter: @GraphicMatt