- City of Calgary:
- City of Edmonton:In anticipation, Calgary has provided a list of projects that could be started within 120 days, ranging from a ordable housing to new LRT lines to green initiatives.
The city, which is spending $4 billion on capital projects over the next three years, has a much more expensive list that is unfunded.
Edmonton has identified $2.4 billion worth of projects that could start immediately if federal funding becomes available in Tuesday's budget.- City of Lethbridge:
These include the $825-million extension of the LRT from downtown to NAIT, $462
million for new buses and $50 million to revitalize 118th Avenue.
- Edmonton Mayor Stephen Mandel also joined other Big Cities Mayors in calling for accelerated infrastructure funding.Lethbridge Mayor Bob Tarleck echoed those sentiments, saying tax cuts are not the answer.
Instead, he said, the government needs to do something "sharply focused" on a short-term basis, such as labour intensive infrastructure programs.
Tarleck suggested the creation of affordable housing or retrofitting existing housing to make it more energy efficient, would help the economy and those living on the streets.
- The Alberta Urban Municipalities Association:
...(AUMA) is encouraged to learn that tomorrow’s federal budget will contain new dollars for infrastructure projects, including for green infrastructure, in time to fight the recession.AUMA President Lloyd Bertschi says this commitment today by federal Infrastructure Minister John Baird, along with the federal government’s pledge to accelerate existing infrastructure funding, will create thousands of new jobs and speed up much-needed repairs to Alberta’s municipal infrastructure
even if the money went to these very deserving infrastructure programs, they simply won't get off the ground as long as the Feds expect the municipalities to kick in a 1/3 of the costs (throw the provinces 1/3 into the mix as well).
ReplyDeleteSean S: that's the key: the money has to be offered without the matching funds requirement. And if the Feds only come up with a third of the cost, take the money and build the portions that it can cover.
ReplyDeleteIt's for this reason the Ontario government has absolved the municipalities of its 1/3rd responsibility. And if the feds don't kick in their third, we'll continue on regardless, building what we can afford, at a slower pace.