More along the road

Windsorites may have to pay more if city council approves a progressive road tax.

 

A revised road tax levy was brought up at the executive committee meeting at city hall on Nov. 23. The proposal is an incremental tax levy of point five per cent. This puts roughly $2 million to use for repairing and reconstructing the city’s roads. According to this year’s Asset Management Plan, the very good road conditions were at approximately 41 per cent which is a two per cent increase from 2013. However, the “very poor” percentage increased by point one per cent. Ward 9 councillor Hilary Payne has been requesting the road tax levy and said he is confident about the proposal.

 

“I’m very confident because all of us councillors have issues in our wards that (the) roads need reconstruction and rehabilitation,” said Payne.

 

With the current city budget, the roads’ poor and very poor conditions would increase from 196.8 km to 358.5 km in the next 20 years. The proposed point five per cent tax levy would decrease the negative conditions to 73.4 km in the same time span. For the average homeowner, there would be a $14 tax increase.

 

Our West End outreach coordinator, Tamara Murray, said she has seen some improvements to the roads in the west end.

 

“We’ve seen some wonderful improvements along the Wyandotte West business strip, the beautification has brought communities together and businesses are filling themselves in naturally,” Murray said.

 

According to the City of Windsor agenda most of the money would go towards repairing EC Row Expressway. The arterial roads would be next, followed by collector roads and any money remaining would go towards the local roads. Payne said the City’s roads are a more concerning issue when it comes to other levies.

 

“This is an internal levy,” said Payne. “We have to do a better and a quicker job of reconstructing a major city asset which is of the course the city roadways.”

 

City council will decide whether or not to approve the road tax levy at the budget meeting on Dec. 21.