Opinion-David Barker’s Delegation to Council February 17th, 2026

I am amazed and extremely disappointed that City Council is willing to in effect give away (according to staff’s figures) between almost $17 million and just over $40 million of anticipated revenue by way of waiving development charges for a 2-year period.

The only way this loss of revenue can be absorbed is through higher property taxes.

My position on this, as you might already tell, is that development charges should not, and I repeat not, be eliminated no matter what the time period the elimination would stand.

I have two reasons for taking this position.

The first reason being that if development charges are eliminated, the cost to install the services usually covered by development charges will fall upon the property taxpayer – that’s you and me. Why should the property taxpayer bear these charges for which it gets no benefit? It’s easy for Council to vote to eliminate development charges because Council does not foot the bill. Property taxpayers foot the bill.

My second reason I guess is more to do with my upset with developers as a whole.

Commercial businesses are there to make a profit at the customer’s expense. That is understood and accepted by society. If, however, a business is unable to make a profit, it more than likely would go out of business. Sure, there are instances where a governmental body may step in to bail out a failing business because of the effect a failure would have on society and the rest of the economy at large. In such cases, Provincial and Federal governments have funds available, giving them the ability to bail out a corporation. Sure, those funds do come from taxpayers – again, that’s you and me. But the load is spread over a much larger tax-paying base. Our municipal government does not have any such resource available to it. Any elimination of development charges will fall directly and immediately upon the existing tax base. So, in effect, the existing tax base is subsidizing to some extent the purchaser of the new home that the developer is building. Why should that be? My feelings towards developers are not kind ones, I know. Why is that? Well, in my view, over the last 10 years or so, developers have been raking in great profits on their development projects, whilst all the time totally ignoring the wishes of Burlington residents and their council, regarding zoning and height restrictions.

They have, in effect, shown Burlington the middle finger. Now they come crying and want our help, which will allow them to continue showing us the middle finger and ignoring our wishes and zoning by-laws.

Certainly, we do need the developments built and new affordable homes made available to the population. Hopefully, the developments will include large numbers of affordable rental homes, but I doubt that.

My solution is to allow property developers a deferral, not an elimination, of development charges for which they are responsible. I would suggest a deferral be until such time as the development is completed, a certificate of occupancy is issued, and 75% is sold or occupied, at which time the deferral fees would be payable in full.

In my opinion, our council should be saying no to eliminating development charges and only allowing a deferral if really needs be. But Council should be pushing back on developers, directing them towards Provincial and Federal governments, whose taxes and other charges are more significant.

At the Committee of the Whole 3 councilors voted in favour of the elimination of development charges; 2 voted against; and 2 (Councilors Kearns and Sharman) were absent.

I am hoping my delegation here is not in vain and that Counsellors Kearns and Sharman will vote with Councillors Nisan and Stolte to defeat this motion. 

Hopefully you are not only hearing my voice and the voices of your financially strained constituents but you’re listening and you will send the matter back to staff for further consideration. Thank you for your time.