Connectivity, public transit, and the opioid crisis were the three topics discussed by PG City Councillor Garth Frizzell and the Finance Committee yesterday (Tuesday).
According to Frizzell, a new fibre line was announced two years ago between Prince George and Dawson Creek.
He told MyPGNow.com that hasn’t quite panned out.
“The promise of that announcement two years ago was that we would be on the superhighway and we would have redundant fibre going all the way into the backbone through the north and out to Alberta but that hasn’t happened yet.”
“Here we are in the 21st Century and there are some communities that still don’t have high-speed internet access where at the same time, we’re looking at the 5G networks rolling out and we aren’t anywhere near where we need to be for the next generation of internet.”
Ridership on local buses has been gutted by the pandemic according to Frizzell.
He noted the drop in ridership is quite steep.
“We’re down about 70% in our ridership from this time last year so even though we are starting to move back to fares we are not going to recover those lost revenues so it’s a significant hit.”
The city also continues to lose a million dollars a month in operating costs, a trend that can’t continue.
“Every month if we lose a million dollars that’s almost the equivalent of an additional one per cent on the tax roll, we can’t sustain that. We’re not going to be after nine months raising the property taxes nine per cent, that’s not something that works with our government tax system.”
“After nine months if we lost nine million dollars, that’s the equivalent to our snow budget and a few other things. In Vancouver, they are talking about a 22% tax increase, in Toronto, maybe a 40% increase, it’s just a staggering number and municipalities don’t have anywhere else to turn.”
The Select Standing Committee is in the middle of public consultations, which includes over 300 presentations from every corner of BC.
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