Freedom Flyer 10

Dear Sir:

When interviewed by Oakville Beaver reporter Lilian DiRisio about Freedom Party's Business Improvement Area pamphlet campaign, BIA backers Richard Carson and Julie Jelinek accused us of telling untruths and distorting the facts. In reality it is they who have misrepresented the situation.

Carson claims that BIAs are not another form of government taxation, which is totally wrong. BIAs can only be set up with the assistance of municipal governments, which must pass a bylaw to create one. Once in place, the BIA has the power to force businessmen to pay its annual levies. A tax is any government-imposed levy which is compulsory. Failure to pay will result in consequences no different for the businessman than if he fails to pay his property, business or income tax. He has no choice about whether to pay, how much to pay or when to pay. If BIAs are not a form of taxation, why does the town staff set a mill rate for the downtown BIA?

Jelinek stresses the consultation between the BIA and its members as one of the benefits. Yet according to one business proprietor whom I spoke to, notices about BIA breakfast meetings and advertising promotions are often received too late to be useful.

And what's the point of being able to elect a Board of Management that can be dissolved by town council and replaced by its appointees? This is precisely what happened in North York when businessmen opposed to their BIA were elected and attempted to reduce the budget and disband the BIA.

Both Carson and Jelinek imply that local merchants benefit by belonging to a group, but they are wrong on two counts.

First, merchants aren't the only ones forced into joining BIAs. All businesses, including lawyers, doctors, architects, bank branches, gas stations, etc. (all of which are in the downtown BIA) are forced to pay the BIA tax - and they are all treated as a single group with one common interest! Thus, a religious bookstore can end up being forced to subsidize the promotion of a tavern and vice versa.

Second, BIAs do not work as a group. A legitimate group relies on the voluntary cooperation of its members, who join without being forced to do so, and who join for a recognized and agreed upon mutual interest. Those who do not recognize or share this mutual interest are not forced to join.

In contrast a BIA lumps all the businesses in an area together - including competitors - and then attempts to promote them as a unit. How can such promotions possibly benefit so many different businesses, each of which has its own distinct identity and reputation? Since a BIA doesn't have to earn the money it spends on promotion, it is not under any obligation to make effective use of that money.

The most glaring error of all can be found in the figures given by Jelinek for the downtown BIA's budget. Not only do they differ from those given to us by the town treasurer's office, they even contradict each other! According to Jelinek the 1986 budget was $165,350, but her figures for separate items total $173,274. This latter figure is still $3,000 below the budget figure supplied by the treasurer's office.

In addition Jelinek's figures only cover the last three years. She is conspicuously quiet about the period from 1978 to 1984 in view of our calculation that the downtown BIA's budget - and taxes - increased at an average annual rate of 43% over its first eight years. The fact is that our statements are based on the information we received from the treasurer's office, and I have confirmed the accuracy of those figures. The budget has grown from $10,000 in 1978 to $176,274 last year, and this does indeed represent an average increase of 43% per year.

I invite anyone who shares our concerns about Business Improvement Areas to contact Freedom Party headquarters in London. After all, freedom of choice is what we're all about.