Proposed reforms pit taxi industry against Uber in marathon city hall meeting

As the first public debate on new regulations for taxis and companies like Uber begins, Lyft says for the first time it is eyeing Toronto for expansion.

Thestar.com
April 14, 2016
By Jennifer Pagliaro

Personal attacks, emotional outbursts and two very divided groups filled Toronto’s council chamber Thursday during the first public debate on new regulations for taxis and companies like Uber.

Mayor John Tory has promised “to level the playing field” after Uber disrupted the strictly regulated taxi industry. With staff-recommended reforms finally in hand, people representing the taxi industry at the licensing and standards committee meeting Thursday were less than impressed.

“The mayor’s mantra, while he delayed us time and time and time again, has been, ‘Give us a chance to level the playing field and not allow the wild west,’ said Larry Labovitch, of City Taxi. “What we have here is a playing field so tilted in Uber’s favour, that we, the taxi industry, will slide right off the field and into oblivion.”

He, and many of more than 100 people signed up to speak after him, said those rules would in effect legalize a wild west.

As the meeting stretched into the evening, committee members voted to adjourn and continue on Friday for a second marathon day.

Councillors on the committee who have defended the traditional regime while railing against Uber in the past now plan to heavily amend the recommended reforms to create what they say would be a more equitable industry.

Final approval is up to council, which next meets May 3. If the regulations are forwarded to council, as expected, council as a whole can reverse any of those changes and make their own.

Thursday’s meeting began with a charged statement from committee chair Cesar Palacio, who as a member of Tory’s executive committee is under unique pressure to push the reforms through.

Tory backed the staff recommendations last week, urging the committee not to hold up reforms.

“It is our job as regulators to try to strike a balance to ensure that regulations are fair and aren’t too difficult to either side to achieve,” Palacio said in a kind of speech not typically made ahead of a debate.

“I want to be very clear, as chair of the committee, that I will ensure that this item is not going to be hijacked by any member of city council in any way, either by receiving it, deferring it or killing it. This item will go to city council, where it belongs.

“I agree with Mayor Tory that this item should go to city council, and that’s it.”

Committee members face a mid-term shuffle of their appointments later this year.

Uber users and drivers had also signed up to speak - though in smaller numbers - to defend the company and urge bylaw reforms to fully legalize their services.

The first group of speakers Thursday said they use Uber’s accessible services to get around the city easier.

Critical committee members challenged them on differing safety standards for Uber, to which they responded by saying increased safety measures would be welcome — but not if enforcing them led to Uber pulling out of Toronto.

“Right now I’ve got accessible transportation, so I don’t want to lose accessible transportation. And I feel safe,” said Tracy Schmitt, a four-way amputee. “I would love for those to be in place, but not at the cost of losing UberAssist and UberWav.”

Councillors critical of the new rules say decades of reforms to make taxis safe and reliable are being reversed to appease the industry as companies like Uber are legalized.

Councillor and committee member Jim Karygiannis wants to amend the new rules to require all vehicles, including Uber’s, to have snow tires and closed-circuit cameras, and all drivers to have a command of English.

While Uber Canada leaders quietly supported the regulations in an interview with the Star, they did not sign up to speak Thursday.

As the debate was underway, a second U.S.-based company announced it wants to expand to Toronto.

Though Lyft - which operates much like Uber by connecting passengers to private, non-taxi rides through a mobile app - has been coy about its plans to break into the Toronto market, a submission to the licensing committee suggested the company is eager.

“Toronto is a world-class city, and one we are very interested in coming to,” reads the statement from Mike Masserman, Lyft’s senior director of government relations. The statement, later shared with media, was sent to the committee by Crestview Strategy, a hired lobbying group that has been meeting with the mayor’s office and councillors for months.

“While we have no immediate plan to launch, Lyft sees tremendous opportunity for ridesharing in Toronto and looks forward to collaborating with city councillors and policy makers on a smart set of regulations that would allow Lyft and the ridesharing industry to thrive in the city,” it says.