Premier Dalton McGuinty says municipalities will get further relief from expenses downloaded by the province in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s.
During a recent visit to Hensall McGuinty told Bayshore Broadcasting News the process of uploading those expenses will take time.
The Premier says Queen’s Park has been reclaiming responsibility for a range of expenses borne at the municipal level for much of the last decade.
With an eye to the October 6th provincial election McGuinty told reporters that uploading will reduce the burden on municipal tax bases and ratepayers.
McGuinty says uploading is an ongoing process that will take time.
He offers no firm schedule and says a plan is in place that his government intends to stick to.
McGuinty admits his government is hobbled by fiscal considerations.
The Premier will only say the Liberals will stick to its uploading plan as long as it doesn’t stand in the way of reducing the provincial deficit.
The governments of former Conservative Premiers Mike Harris and Ernie Eves transferred responsibility of paying for a wide range of infrastructure and services.
Among the most notable of the downloads was a large portion of the province’s highway network that was off-loaded onto Counties and Regional Municipalities.
The province recently announced it will gradually take back responsibility for the cost of court security which will be fully taken over in 2018.
Paying for court security accounts for up to 100-thousand dollars a year in the Goderich municipal budget.
