TTC approves 10 cent fare increase
$61-million hole in next year’s budget left for council to address.

thestar.com
By Ben Spurr
Nov. 21, 2016

The TTC board has approved a 10-cent fare increase, but has declined to endorse more drastic measures to balance its books.

The decision means that the transit agency’s budget will head to the city’s budget committee with a significant deficit, which councillors will have to decide how to fill.

At a special meeting of the board on Monday to consider the transit agency’s 2017 budget, commissioners voted in favour of the 10-cent fare hike, which will be the sixth time in as many years that the cost of riding the TTC has gone up.

TTC Chair Josh Colle told reporters after the vote that the decision to raise fares “really sucks,” but was unavoidable due to the financial pressure facing the transit agency.

“A fare increase that nobody really wanted was necessary,” he said.

In order to “soften the blow” however, Colle successfully moved a motion asking the board to “endorse” a fare freeze in 2018. The motion isn’t binding, but Colle said it would ensure that transit agency staff will draft an initial 2018 budget that doesn’t raise fares.

More than a dozen members of the public signed up to speak at the meeting and oppose the rising cost of transit. They included 76-year-old Patricia Reid, who said she could only afford 15 TTC tickets a month and was “devastated” at the prospect of another price hike.

“I actually walked here from Queen and Lansdowne because I didn’t have the tickets,” she said. “I’m thinking actually if you raise the fares, I’ll probably have to hitchhike ’cause I can’t do anything more.”

The increase is expected to raise $27 million next year, and will go into effect Jan. 1.

Despite the increased revenue, the TTC is still facing a shortfall of at least $61 million in its operating budget. That figure could be closer to $100 million if the agency isn’t allowed to use a controversial accounting manoeuvre that has already been rejected by the city manager.

The TTC staff report that went before the board included a long list of potential divisive ways to bridge the remaining gap, including raising fares by as much as 50 cents, cutting bus and streetcar service, and eliminating fare discounts for seniors, students, and even the blind.

The list came without any recommendation from TTC staff, and the proposals weren’t endorsed by the board. Instead, commissioners chose to submit the budget to the city without bridging the gap, meaning it will ultimately be up to council to find the money to balance the TTC’s books.

Asked what message the board was sending by submitting a budget that wasn’t balanced, board member Councillor Shelly Carroll said the TTC has “found all of the non-service cuts that we can.”

“The next thing we do is begin to cut away at all of those service adds that the mayor was so proud to put in, in 2015. We don’t want to do that.”

Carroll argued that to bridge the shortfall council should increase its subsidy to the TTC, which last year the subsidy was about $611 million for the TTC’s conventional service and Wheel-Trans.

In Julycouncil voted to direct all city departments to find ways to cut their budgets by 2.6 per cent. That target created a shortfall for the TTC that was originally estimated at $231 million.

The TTC has found about $170 million to fill the gap. That includes the fare increase, and savings from reducing projections for fuel, overtime, and employee benefit costs, and pushing back the timeline for switching to the Presto fare card system.

Council is expected to vote in February on the budget for all city agencies and departments, including the TTC subsidy.

The fare increase next year will see a token’s cost rise from $2.90 to $3, while a regular Metropass will sell for $146.25, up from $141.50. Adult cash fare stays at $3.25, and children 12 and under will still ride for free.