Recreation and Taxes

Concern about rising obesity rates has stimulated a growing interest in physical fitness. Private fitness centres are popping up everywhere and governments have gotten in on the act as well. Publicly funded facilities have become the darling of politicians. New arenas, recreation centres, and swimming pools, encouraged by provincial and federal grants (your money disguised as a gift) have begun to sprout like weeds. Of course, building a facility is one thing. Running it is another. Most require public subsidies paid for through property taxes.

Despite the promotion of physical fitness the reality is that most of people are not interested in formal physical activity and, in particular, are reluctant to pay for it. Organized sports attract only a small part of the population and rarely will those who use fitness centres exceed 20% of the population. Typical reasons for not using recreation facilities (aside from a lack of interest) are financial considerations and convenience.

The less one has to spend after providing for the basic needs of life the less likely it is that a person or family will want to pay for exercise. Promoters of public facilities say that fitness really doesn't cost much and simply cutting out a few luxuries would pay for the facilities and fees. They conveniently ignore all the other demands on a family's finances. Expecting a single mother with a minimum wage job to pay for exercise when she must struggle to put food on the table is callous in the extreme. The same applies to a family suffering from lay-offs or reduced to part time work.

Convenience is another huge issue. The distance people must travel to a recreational facility influences how much they will use it. The Canadian Automobile Association says that driving a mid-size sedan will cost roughly fifty cents per kilometre when depreciation, fuel, maintenance, insurance costs and other costs are included. To people living within four or five kilometres of a recreation centre that may mean nothing. To a person living forty kilometres or more away it is a major issue. How does one justify a $40.00 trip to exercise in a place where you will still have to pay to play? There have been many studies of the effect of distance on use and none of the results are encouraging. The more you must travel the less likely you are to use a facility.

Even when facilities are close by many people just lack the interest, the need, or the desire to use the facility. Often interest in fitness centres is short term and private fitness clubs readily acknowledge that one of their major problems is member turnover.

It is a tough business and it should be no surprise that public facilities rely on subsidies to survive.

All these issues raise the problem of how governments should fund facilities that will only be used by a minority of the public. The obvious solution - having users pay - never gets much support even from those who can afford higher fees. This reluctance to pay forces governments to take the easy way and raise property taxes. Of course, property taxes always penalize low income families who must pay a larger percentage of their income for housing. Not many people with low incomes will welcome the prospect of subsidizing the play of their wealthier neighbours.

Since the majority of the population will not use a facility the question for governments is how to treat the majority of the population fairly. Queens Place poses a typical problem. We have a significant population of low income families, a widely spread out population, and employment that has proven unreliable over the past year or so. None of this is the local government's fault but it still must shoulder the responsibility of doing the best it can for the majority of it citizens who will get little or no value from Queens Place. Fortunately there are ways to make things more fair. Municipal governments are allowed to manipulate the tax structure to offset inequities in income and access.

One example is what they already do for low income people in the form of tax reductions. This could easily be expanded to offset the tax increase attributed to Queens Place. The difference could be made up by an increase in the tax rate for the well to do.

Another method that would appeal to those who live at greater distances from Liverpool is a zoned tax that decreases as one gets farther from Liverpool. For example, people in Liverpool who live closest to the centre would pay the highest tax rate. Those 5 kilometres would pay 75%, those 10 kilometres would pay 50% and those 15 kilometres would pay 25% and those over 20 kilometres would pay 5% (the numbers are just an example and could be much different). The point is that one should not be penalized for living at a distance from Liverpool.

Another method is an area rate that varies according to access. We already have these where a facility is used primarily by the people of a specific area.

No doubt there are other methods. The challenge is for council to find the best method. It is never too complicated or difficult to treat everyone fairly. We pay for it and we deserve it.

Unfortunately council is unlikely to do anything unless people insist on action. The only way to insist on action is to contact your councillor and tell him or her you expect a fair deal. It only takes a phone call. You need only say, “I oppose a flat property tax increase and I expect you to act on my behalf.” Do not accept any gobbledegook from your councillor. They should either do something better or be honest enough to tell you they really don't care about your problems.

(For an explanation of how property taxes punish low income families see the editorial www.queenslife.ca/features.html )