Ontario will ‘be there’ to help Toronto out of $815M shortfall, finance minister says

Ontario Finance Minister Peter Bethlenfalvy said Tuesday that the province will “be there again” to help Toronto through a massive budgetary shortfall brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic and said he is confident the federal government will commit to doing so as well.

Speaking with Newstalk1010's Moore in the Morning a day after unveiling Ontario's fall economic update, Bethlenfalvy said that while money for the city was not specifically laid out in the update, the province plans to lend support.

“We continue to have conversations with the with the mayor and his office, because there are some lingering COVID costs and we've been there before, we'll be there again ,” Bethlenfalvy said when asked about Toronto’s finances.

Tory penned a letter last week to the federal and provincial governments warning them that Toronto faces an $815 million budgetary shortfall this year due to revenue losses still being felt from the pandemic.

In the letter, Tory warned that Toronto might have to make "deep cuts to services" if the higher levels of government did not once again help the city make up the shortfall as they did over the past two years.

Referring to Bethlenfalvy’s comments while speaking with reporters at a housing announcement in East York Tuesday, Tory said he “sees the glass as half full.”

“I take that as a pretty firm statement of intention to act and I understand why that wouldn't have found its way into the fall economic statement, because it's not a definite thing until the federal government signs up,” Tory said.

Her added that he is “confident those governments will be there because I think that they understand that the health and well-being and the recovery of the city is essential to the well-being and recovery of Ontario and Canada.”

In his radio interview, Bethlenfalvy pointed out that the province has already supported Toronto “to the tune of $2.8 billion” to help make up for transit revenue shortfalls through the pandemic as well as to support shelters and social programs.

He also expressed confidence that the federal government will "step up as they've done that in the past.”

Tory acknowledged that the city is now waiting on the federal government to confirm its support.

As it awaits word, an estimated $300 million in capital projects have already been put on hold in the event the funding doesn’t materialize.

“There is really no rejection of the fact that what we're asking for is all entirely COVID related, not some other programs we want them to fund for some other reason,” Tory said. “It's just a matter of getting everybody to the point where they agree they should both help at the same time and perhaps a bit of a challenge deciding how much each of the others should help, you know on a sort of percentage basis if I can call it that, but I'm working on that.”

The provincial government is also looking to Ottawa for help to support its ambitious housing plans. The province has proposed incentivizing developers to create more rental and affordable housing by waiving development charges which normally flow to municipalities. However Tory warned last week that the move would be "devastating" for Toronto's finances, leaving it an additional $200 million short.

Tory's letter last week asked for a funding commitment from both levels of government by the end of November, a month before the city’s fiscal year-end.