TransLink fallout
The scrutiny has begun, as everyone with a stake in transportation and transit focuses in on the TransLink governance review.The Langley Times is the first community paper out of the gate with the standard Black Press piece.
More interesting is the Times' interview with report author Marlene Grinnell. The former Langley City mayor said it was important to include future funding provisions and to show the public a direct line of electoral accountability (i.e., your community's mayor is your TransLink representative).
The plan gets a cautious endorsement from the Times editor.
Anyway, the Vancouver Sun continues its examination of the plan today with a lengthy piece on the funding structure:
The new provincial fuel-tax money will cover only one-third of the $200 million a year TransLink will need by 2013 to build everything in its plans.
In order to get it, TransLink will have to raise another one-third, or close to $70 million, from increased property taxes, and the final third from a combination of higher fares and revenue from property development around rapid transit stations and other TransLink facilities.
Under the plan, TransLink will get an additional three cents per litre from the provincial fuel tax, in addition to the 12 cents it already gets, which will provide $66 million in new revenue as early as next year.
The parking tax and Hydro levy will be scrapped, but TransLink will have to replace the revenue -- about $37 million in total -- by raising property taxes, on commercial and industrial property for the parking tax money, and on residential property for the Hydro levy.
The fuel-tax money would kick in immediately, but TransLink would have up to 10 years to ramp up its share of the revenue.
The report includes a suggested scenario in which TransLink would approve small property tax increases -- one to two per cent per year -- every year from 2008 through 2025. And it suggests fare hikes of one-half to one per cent per year every year for the next 14 years.
The plan also gives TransLink the teeth it needs to override municipal interference with regional plans:
The plan also calls for TransLink to be given power to override municipal zoning and permitting decisions in order to get its major projects built, said Marlene Grinnell, the former Langley City mayor who chaired the review panel.
That will be a bitter pill to swallow for many Lower Mainland communities. I know it raises concerns for me as a Langley Township Councillor.
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