City Council approves billboard tax, more user fees

Toronto city council has approved a new tax on billboards, along with a series of new or increased user fees for parking tickets and property tax accounts that one councillor warned are too high for residents given the economy.

The city's new sign bylaw harmonizes disparate rules that govern signs differently in each corner of the city by stating where they can go, restricting measurements and limiting how close they can come to other signs. The reforms resulted in a heated debate that pitted local activists, intent on beautifying the city and using the tax as a way to fund public art, against a billboard industry that says the measures are too punitive.

New billboards are subject to a scale of taxes, based on type and size of sign, that range from $1,150 to $24,000 a year.

Once fully phased in, the tax is expected to generate $10.4-million, an amount the industry says is so high, it will kill it.

"When you're talking about a tax that is more than the industry's profits, you're going to decimate the industry. How can they survive?" said Rosanne Caron, president of the Out-of-Home Marketing Association of Canada, which represents major billboard companies.

Mayor David Miller, however, dismissed those concerns, saying "billboards are a licence to print money." City staff and OMAC presented wildly divergent estimates on what the industry makes every year.

About $1.4-million of the money the tax generates will go to covering the cost of enforcement, the rest into the city coffers to be allocated during the budget process. Council decided not to immediately commit the money to arts programs, but activists said yesterday they're confident that is where it will end up.

"This sign bylaw controls the amount of advertising, the numbers of signs.... You do need to regulate this kind of advertising because otherwise the logic of the market means that it will be everywhere," Mr. Miller said after the vote.

Council also voted to start charging $50 for every new property tax account that is created. That will only apply to new developments, city staff had explained earlier, and is meant to cover the cost of delivering the service.

The city will also charge $16 (up from $5) to get a prior tax receipt, $50 (up from $35) to add charges to the tax roll, and increase the cost of paying a parking ticket over the phone to $2 from $1.50 next year.

Council voted not to increase the parking-ticket fee for online payments, and also passed a motion to phase out that fee over three years.

Councillor Doug Holyday (Etobicoke Centre) called the recommendations "too steep under the present economic circumstances" and introduced a series of motions that would soften the blow to the taxpayer, most of which did not pass.