Commission collecting comments on draft bylaw for ride-booking services

TheWhig.com
Nov. 27, 2017
Elliot Ferguson

The public is to get a chance to comment on a proposed city bylaw to govern ride-booking services, such as Uber.

The Kingston Area Taxi Commission is holding a special meeting Tuesday night at 5:30 p.m. at City Hall to hear input about the draft bylaw.

The meeting is being held in response to Uber Canada’s call for greater public input into the bylaw.

The public has not had a proper chance to read and review the proposed bylaw and provide input, Chris Schafer, public policy manager with Uber Canada, said.

“Give residents of Kingston that opportunity. There hasn’t really been that opportunity to date,” Schafer said.

Schafer said Kingston’s draft bylaw is unfair to ride-booking companies and goes far beyond what other municipalities have done to regulate their business.

The draft bylaw requires prospective drivers to go in person to the police station for a traditional criminal background check, to be fingerprinted and provide sworn affidavits, and to be tested for their knowledge of the city.

Under the draft bylaw, each Uber driver must have a traditional paper and photo licence.

The draft bylaw also caps the number of Uber vehicles in the city at 150, with no more than 50 vehicles online in a 24-hour period, and the vehicles themselves have to be less than six years old and carry two decals identifying them as Uber.

Mark Greenwood, owner of Amey’s Greenwood Taxi, said the provisions in the draft bylaw are necessary.

“We’ve been at the bylaws for two and a half years,” he said. “Basically it is just for the protection of the public.”

Greenwood said key public safety provisions, such as the need for proof of insurance, driver criminal background checks and vehicle safety inspections, need to be administered by a government agency, not a for-profit company.

“All they are interested in is the bottom line. They are interested in the money, they are not interested in the public,” he said. “That’s why the taxi commission exists: to protect the public and put in laws that say it is the enforcer, not a company.

“Companies are not good at enforcing themselves, unless they have an oversight body.”

Not everyone is so down on Uber.

The Alma Mater Society of Queen’s University has opposed the draft bylaw for being too restrictive.

“The proposed bylaw marks a profound divergence from comparative best practices used across jurisdictions in Ontario, Canada, and the rest of the world,” the AMS wrote in a letter to the taxi commission. “The AMS strongly opposes bylaw No. 4’s attempt to stifle the operational model of Uber and other commercial ride-sharing companies by imposing unfair restrictions and conditions on their continued operation in Kingston.”

Mothers Against Drunk Driving also called on the taxi commission to include “ride-sharing regulations that will allow Uber to continue operating in Kingston without unnecessary requirements that other cities that have already regulated ridesharing have not included in their bylaws.”