Read on Twitter
Re: the still-murky 
-provincial $ deal to help municipalities announced yesterday. I'll hold off on detailed comments until there are actual details to comment on. But for now, I'll note a few things at a higher level... 1/7 https://twitter.com/CraigScottNL/status/1284093434245062656
-provincial $ deal to help municipalities announced yesterday. I'll hold off on detailed comments until there are actual details to comment on. But for now, I'll note a few things at a higher level... 1/7 https://twitter.com/CraigScottNL/status/1284093434245062656
/2 Some of the best political advice I ever got was "get to the endgame." By doing this in the most complex and half-hearted way possible, Ottawa has guaranteed months of bumps, ??s & issues like Mayor Scott's as the $ filters its way down through a broken fiscal federation.
/3 Remember, again, this is a squabble over printed QE money. Whether Ottawa eventually rolls BoC debts over indefinitely or just writes them off per Friedman's 'helicopter drop,' every fed C$ added (or not!) costs very little relative to a $ of cost elsewhere in the federation.
/4 I get to say I told you so, so I'm gonna say it. Ottawa had the authority & the opportunity to have moved this $ directly to cities. It voluntarily chose to forgo that authority. Some of us warned this would mean months of negotiation and complexity, w/ no practical benefit.
/5 As the months elapsed, local reserves were burnt too early in a recession, capital projects cancelled, 000s of local workers laid off w/ no CERB to turn to while Ottawa's civil service remains cheerfully intact. Many layoffs are likely now permanent based on yesterday's math.
/6 And to those syaing "but there's waste in local govt!" - I'm speaking as a guy who's helped deliver real savings & tax cuts to a city budget before. City cuts in 2020 were driven by cash flow desperation, not savings potential - so, *by necessity* the dumbest cuts possible.
/7 So in short, while I'm very happy this offers real support for real people and real priorities, and I'm happy the provs & feds agreed to act, I'm not sure why we had to do this the hard way, especially since it may mean having to do it all over again in six months' time.
