Thank you to all members of the Manifesto Facebook group for enduring the mass messages about this campaign. You were all a part of history.  There may be a few more updates so please bear with us if this does not interest you at this time (believe me though, you will feel the ripple effects of this in our city for years to come).

 

The process will continue and we may call on you for support to come through or get involved to continue to move this forward.  With this triumphant victory, it is proof that citizens of Toronto working together can play a key role in transforming and changing policy, so if you see a need or an issue, please get in touch so we can have these issues on our radar.

 

Now for the info...

 

 

The billboard tax passed at 10.4 million in revenue annually along with the new bylaw. This massive step forward means that thousands of arts projects will eventually be funded and that many of the problems associated with excessive and illegal billboard signage are finally being addressed. We are in support of Councillor Carroll's motion to deal with the disbursement of funds in the 2010 Budget Process. She has made a firm commitment that it will go to city beautification through the arts and in no way wants her motion to be perceived as taking the money away from the arts. It needed to be done this way to get it through Council at the amount necessary to compensate Torontonians properly for use of public space and not have a bunch of Councillor's personal projects eat away at the allotment. To be short, it was the best way to get a clean vote.

 

That said, it must also be mentioned that the majority were less likely to support this tax if it does not go to art (see this pdf) question 2.  The allotment to art has also been a central part of how this tax has been sold to the public -- almost all of the staff reports, Executive Committee, PGM Committee and independently commissioned research states that the funds will eventually go to arts. The majority of Councillors on the Budgeting Committee know that they would not have the new funds without the arts community thinking up the idea and ushering through the system and now has the moral obligation to properly finish this process.

 

Thank you for all your help. We won it. Might not be how we wanted it in our wildest dreams but this is the next best thing.