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Bell: City bombshell makes Olympic Yes tougher to sell

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This is what Calgarians weren’t supposed to hear until after they voted Yes or No to the Olympics.

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This is what members of city council heard days ago behind the infamous closed doors of city hall’s Cowtown Kremlin.

This is what caused councillors days ago to tell us what they heard was downright devastating.

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As Calgarians line up in the first day of advance voting on the Olympic bid a political bomb drops at the big blue playpen downtown.

Some pie-in-the-sky types, cavorting with their unicorns while planning their next rally and pushing their tiresome snow job, still try to sell us on how another Olympics will fix what ails us.

But their rah-rah routine seems so hollow, so far removed from the city council chamber where politicians are getting a rude awakening.

As you know, the office tower golden goose downtown isn’t kicking out the taxes it once did. Tens of thousands have lost their jobs.

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There are a lot of empty offices.

“As vacancies go up, the lease rates go down. As lease rates go down, the property values go down,” says city manager Jeff Fielding.

And the tax haul goes down big-time.

“The business is not there based on the strength of the economy we had in 2014. That’s been lost to us.”

He points to a graph and the ugliness of the ’80s.

“It took a long time to recover from that downturn. I suspect we’re in that same type of situation here. It looks similar,” says Fielding.

And it’s not just a case of filling the downtown offices with folks attracted to lower lease rates. As long as the lease rates stay down the city still has a problem.

Fielding doesn’t see the situation turning around in the near future.

Who is going to pick up the slack on these lost taxes from downtown business properties?

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The business properties outside the downtown where taxes could be hiked as high as 29%. Yikes.

Over the past two years, the city has thrown taxpayer dough at the problem. One year it was $45 million, the next year $41 million, trying to cap the yearly tax hike to 5%.

This time spending the same sort of cash would just keep the tax increases below 25%.

“I’m telling you I don’t know what to do here,” says Fielding.

“The angry voices out there are real. We can’t deny that. I wish there was something here we would be able to offer them.”

The city will likely shell out $89 million trying to keep those business property tax increases in the suburbs down one more year. But it can’t go on forever.

Things are so nasty, Fielding says even cutting $200 million out of the city budget would make a headline but wouldn’t solve anything.

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Seems cuts would have to be deeper.

As for new stuff, including an NHL arena … Well, there’s a wish list but to make all the wishes come true would require a big tax hike.

It’s quite the reality check with city council caught skating with their heads down.

Of course, the Olympic Yes crowd peddle their fantasies and just say the Games will turn things around.

Coun. Druh Farrell shakes her head.

“To somehow imagine an event eight years in the future is going to solve this really hairy problem … you’re dreaming.”

More like nightmare.

Nenshi says the tax situation is “serious but not that serious” and we shouldn’t be “overly dramatic.”

As for the Olympics, the merry-go-round of misinformation continues. Who the hell does cover security cost overruns?

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The Olympic bid bosses insist Team Trudeau has it under control. Nothing is on paper. They do not reassure us.

Nenshi insists there’s lots of time to sort it out but adds he’d prefer if the federal government would speak with one voice.

He does not reassure us.

When the talk turns to cost overrun insurance, you can see the brain cramps on the faces of some councillors.

It seems most cost overruns you could actually imagine won’t be covered by the insurance and this insurance move was cooked up to make Team Trudeau happy.

Jeromy Farkas is another councillor who cannot believe the Olympic Yes side really thinks the Olympics can wipe Calgary’s woes away.

“If hosting the Games was the economic Holy Grail people are saying it is, you’d have cities tripping over themselves to get the Games.”

But it’s quite the opposite.

Still, Farkas is in a good mood.

“I think Calgarians are going to make themselves heard Nov. 13.”

We can hope enough Calgarians have finally had enough.

rbell@postmedia.com

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