Sustainability should include taxpayers' ability to pay increases - Vancouver Sun

We're supposedly all about sustainability in the City of Vancouver. Too bad city hall hasn't a clue about the concept where it counts most -- the bottom line.

It may not have hit home with our elected pols quite yet, but the City of Vancouver is in danger of sinking into an ocean of red ink. And Vancouverites need to start worrying.

Vancouver's political and bureaucratic stewards have managed to create a de facto structural deficit -- meaning they're spending more than the city takes in.

This problem has been disguised for years, of course, because city hall has hidden its bad management with small, steady, incremental hikes to fees and property taxes. That's easy to do in boom times. Harder to do now, when the economy slows. People are now catching on.