Battle brews between city, Toronto Parking Authority over revenue
CBC
A battle is brewing between the City of Toronto and one of its own agencies over how to share 10s of millions of dollars in profit generated by publicly-owned parking lots.
The Toronto Parking Authority wants to keep more of the cash it makes for the city. It's warning that it will need to defer over $14 million in capital spending this year if a new profit sharing agreement isn't reached in the next few months.
Those "material cuts" could hurt the city's Bike Share and electric vehicle charging programs, the agency says.
The last agreement between the city and TPA expired in 2019 but the terms remain in effect. It requires the agency to give the city either $38 million a year or 85 per cent of the agency's profits, whichever is greater.
The Toronto Parking Authority declined an interview request by CBC Toronto. But at a recent board meeting, executives made the case for a new agreement.
"The time for that new deal is now," Jeffrey Dea, the TPA's vice president of growth and strategy, said at the March meeting.
In a report, the agency says the profit sharing arrangement, which was reached in 2017, is obsolete. It did not account for the expanded duties given to the parking authority by city council in the years since.
Those include operation of Toronto Bike Share and the expansion of its electric vehicle charging station program, programs which cost it millions. The agency says it is grappling with a $300 million state of good repair backlog for its parking lots over the next decade. It also needs to replace over 3,000 Pay & Display machines reaching the end of their life.
"The 85 per cent tax is punitive given the expanded mandate that we have," Dea said of the arrangement.
The parking authority said it has contributed $1.4 billion to the city through the dividend since 2002. That has been used to fund "other municipal services and programs, including public transit, housing and parks."
The talks come at a time when the city is struggling to address large structural deficits every year and contemplating the creation of new taxes and fees to address the gap.
The negotiations between the city and parking authority have been underway for two years. They were projected to wrap up ahead of the 2024 budget cycle earlier this year, but Dea told the board that work to address the city's $1.8 billion deficit delayed discussions.
Coun. Brad Bradford, who is a member of the TPA board, said the agency is at a "breaking point."
"The TPA simply cannot continue to deliver on the things that city council has directed them to, including electric vehicle infrastructure, and a bike share network that's expanding across the city, without retaining more of that revenue," he said.
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