(05-18-2023, 02:15 PM)ac3r Wrote: How much did they contribute? I thought their contribution basically only paid for the 302 buses.
The tax levy is only split by urban/rural, so the region has the same tax rate for all of the cities. From the region's perspective city boundaries don't exist, just like we don't track property tax revenue or expenditure by ward in the cities. So the question of how much Cambridge paid is difficult to answer, as there's a lot of different ways you could split it up, all of which could plausibly be called fair.
If you look just at ION, Cambridge paid the same per dollar of property value as Kitchener and Waterloo. But that neglects that property values are lower in Cambridge, is that something one should adjust for?
But there's also the transit budget as a whole. Cambridge has lower ridership, and therefore the bus service receives a higher taxpayer subsidy in Cambridge. But that's not charged just to Cambridge taxpayers, so you've got a double transfer effect of the lower fare box recovery in Cambridge, and the lower property values in Cambridge.
So, Cambridge paid "the same" as KW, but also benefits from being attached to KW. If Cambridge separated from the region it would have to either raise taxes or cut services.