Several months ago, there was a lot of press, community discussion and even angst over the proliferation of pay day loan businesses and locations in the city of London. A very serious issue was, and is, the use of these businesses by those who in many cases are actually least able to afford them.  The availability of pay day loans is a complicated issue, and one that I don’t want to deal with here.

However, I recently received an advertisement in my mailbox (my real one, attached to my house, not a virtual one on my computer) offering me ‘instant happiness in London’. It was from a large bank and multi-national department store.

I didn’t know instant happiness could be so easy, nor that it could be provided by a bank and a store!  My curiosity piqued, I read that instant happiness was being able to save 5% (large colourful print) on the little things I need and the big things that I want.  And if I couldn’t actually pay for those little things I needed or the big things I really wanted (but couldn’t afford) within 21 days, it would only cost me 19.99%. (smaller print on the back).

 Houston, we have a problem!  And it aint just pay day loans.

Several London Free Press articles caught my attention on Saturday March 30. The first was “MPs take the money and run” about the 1.6% increase in MPs salaries. MPs will now have a base salary of $160,000.

The second was “Top earners get even more” about the provincial sunshine list disclosing how many government workers make more than $100,000.  Apparently there has been an 11% increase in the number of people on the Sunshine list in one year alone.  Apparently over 88,400 Ontario public servants make more than $100,000.

The third was “Verlander strikes it rich” about Detroit Tiger pitcher Justin Verlander recently signing a five year $140,000,000 contract extension that will pay him $28,000,000 per season.

What I found interesting was the language in the articles and commentary related to the headlines. Words and phrases such as “not an April Fool’s day prank”, “fatter pay packets” accompanied the MPs headline.   Words and phrases such as “shocked”, “generous” and “runaway pay hikes are rampant” accompany the Sunshine headline.  Words and phrases such as “illustrious”, “premier pitchers”, “thrilled to keep him” accompanied Verlander’s headline.

 Maybe it’s just me, but the juxtaposition of the articles and language suggests to me that there are much deeper issues that need to be discussed.

The following statement was made in the March 30^th editorial in the London Free Press – “As a community, we’ve agreed our taxes will pay for health care, for education, and for a social safety net should we need one.”

Many times statements need clarification, because it is not always apparent what is meant.  For instance, who is the “we”?  Is this a corporate ‘we’, a neighbourhood ‘ we’, a municipal ‘we’, a provincial ‘we’, a national ‘we’, a majority ‘we’?  You can see the problem I am having trying to understand the comment.

My difficulty in understanding the comment is greater because of the budget that ‘we’ as a municipality recently passed.  Of the nine general programs, social and health services was the only one of the nine programs where expenditures were reduced.  As a community, ‘we’ have actually agreed that social and health services is the least of our priorities. ‘We’ have actually agreed that our taxes will pay for many other things in priority to health care, education and a social safety net.

The April 2013 issue of Moneysense magazine contains its well-known annual ranking of the best places to live in Canada.  Quality of life is measured in 200 cities across the country.

This year, London finished 4^th in the Top Ten large cities in Canada category, behind Calgary, Ottawa and Edmonton, and ahead of Winnipeg.  Fourth across the country! That’s great news.

But when the categories are examined and the check marks counted, we see that London does NOT get a check mark for affordable housing.  In fact, NONE of the top ten large cities get a check mark for affordable housing.

So is a city great where there is a lack of affordable housing?

Collectively we chose to cut Social & Health Services so that we could increase budgets in other areas. How much did we actually choose to cut?

Information through community forums clearly told Londoners that the province is reducing its funding to the city in this area by $3,000,000 (rounded).

In addition, we chose to reduce funding through property taxes by another $3,000,000.  That was solely a City of London choice.

The choice made was for a reduction in social and health services by a total of $6,000,000.  Will we remember this choice in a couple of years when we feel the effects?

What choices did we collectively, through city council make in the 2013 City of London budget?

There are 9 general programs that City of London property taxes support: 

Culture;
Economic Prosperity
Environmental Services
Parks Recreation & Neighbourhood Services
Planning & Development Services
Protective Services
Social & Health Services
Transportation Services
Corporate Operational & Council Services

 In the drive towards a zero percent increase, the only program line item with any significant reduction was Social & Health Services. 

There was the first choice – hold 8 programs at zero or increase them, at the cost of reducing social and health services.

More to come..

The 2013 City of London budget process clearly showed that there are difficult choices that all of us must make.  And with all choices, there are implications.  I had a very uneasy feeling though,  that the impact of the implications weren’t really thought through.

This is not to say that the choices in and of themselves were necessarily good or bad.  Just that we didn’t have a really good discussion of what the implication of those choices really mean.  Perhaps council and all of us really didn’t understand.  And a couple of years from now, when the impact of the implications are seen, we will have forgotten the choices made in the 2013 budget.

More to come…

Just a few days until Christmas, and some of us are struggling with a question – what do you get someone who has everything?  For Christians, Christmas is a celebration of God’s gift to us.  But what if we had a chance to give God a gift?

I think you do have that chance, we all do.

There is a story in the gospel of Matthew where Jesus is talking about eternity, and he says “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.”

When you love his children, you love him. When you love your neighbour, you love him. “Whatever you did for the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.” (Matthew 25;40)

Give God a gift this Christmas.  Love one of his needy children.

Merry Christmas!