A lot of people in this city think they can do a better job than Mayor Rob Ford, and thanks to web developer Raymond Selzer now they have a chance to prove it.
Selzer’s new site, Balance Toronto’s Budget, lets you decide which services you want to keep and which ones you want to cut, and how much each would cost taxpayers. The idea is to find your own way to make up next year’s projected $774-million budget shortfall.
It’s a direct riff on a Toronto Star page, but with an important difference: the results are shareable and a running tally of every user’s budget plan is recorded.
“I wanted to collect people’s opinions and so when the budget rolls around we can see what the most voted for cuts were,” explained Selzer.
As it is, the site’s far from perfect. Although it allows you see the impact of reversing some of Ford’s decisions (like the cancellation of the vehicle registration tax), you can’t come close to balancing the virtual budget without making some Ford-sized cuts, and it doesn’t take into account the savings that will likely be generated by the ongoing efficiency review or the reduction in city staff that the mayor is pushing through.
It also only offers up a tax increase of one per cent, even though Ford himself has said we’ll likely need to raise property taxes by three per cent.
If anything, the site’s cut-heavy bias is evidence of how well the mayor has framed the budget debate in his favour so far. After all his decision to use the $268-million surplus he inherited from David Miller in order to freeze 2011 property taxes, and the eight per cent raise he just gave police officers, have contributed to the budget shortfall he often blames on the previous administration.
Selzer admits he’s no municipal finance expert and says he’s open to building options into the site that aren’t already in Ford’s plans. One suggestion he’s been hearing a lot is road tolls, but he’s not sure how much money that would realistically contribute to the 2012 budget.
While many young downtown dwellers are practically howling for Ford’s blood by now, Selzer, who lives in Little Italy, says he’s not an activist and he’s not taking sides just yet.
“I have my opinions like anyone else would, but I don’t have an agenda to push,” he said. “I’m actually interested in seeing what people have to say, and what people are willing to part with to keep Toronto the way it is.”
For now the site appears a work in progress. If there’s something you’d like to see incorporated into it, you can contact Selzer here.
