My taxes have gone up again this year. Which isn’t too surprising there are only two guarantees in life: death and taxes.
- Property taxes 2.34% increase
- Hydro 11.0% increase
Power is delivered through Newmarket-Tay Power Ltd. – a privately held corporation. It was very hard to dig this information up as there is no mention of who actually owns the company on their website - Water and Sewer 6.5% increase
- Recreation and User Fees 3.5% increase
What really grinds my gears though is when that money isn’t spent appropriately. Take a look at the salaries various mayors I got from this Toronto Star article.
I get that mayors should get paid a decent salary but if you consider the average salary in Ontario is $49,088 Tony Van Bynen’s $180K+ salary is a hefty increase. If you compare it against other towns in Ontario it isn’t that out of line until you calculate the cost compared to the size of the town. If you do that, Rob Ford came in at a thrifty 7 cents per person, while Mr. Van Bynen comes in a whopping 32 times that!
Something is seriously out of whack in Newmarket, thankfully there is a Newmarket Taxpayer Advocacy group. Who will now get a new member.