Toronto vacant home tax: councillors vote to keep program [Video]

Despite a number of councillors calling for the cancellation or suspension of Toronto’s Vacant Home Tax Thursday, the program will live to see another year with city council ordering staff to revamp the process in the wake of a disastrous rollout which saw tens of thousands of property owners receive bills, even though their homes are lived in.

During Thursday’s meeting, councillors considered a motion to scrap the Vacant Home Tax but it was defeated with a vote of 5-18. Instead, councillors adopted a report from city staff that will look into completely revising the Vacant Home Tax program design for the next year.

Before the vote, some councillors pushed to eliminate the program entirely.

“I think it should be scrapped,” Coun. Jon Burnside told CTV News Toronto. “I’m not into that level of social engineering and we’ve seen the problems that it’s caused, not only for residents of the city, but city staff as well. The huge cost, the inconvenience, the anguish – I …