Raise the Hammer

I know you can read, so you must either be ignorant, willfully or other wise, but $7,394 is the shortfall between the cost to build infrastructure for a new home and the development fee charged. If you want to dispute that figure, that's fine, but you'll notice none of the home builders don't even deny the number, let alone provide their own analysis, they just petition to put off the increase. If you had looked into it at all, you'd have noticed that your good buddies Burlington and Oakville charge 80% to 130% more per home than Hamilton currently does.

"Moreover, the people who are getting the BEST deal from the city, are not buyers in the new areas of the city, but new buyers of existing homes. These home buyers did not pay for existing infrastructure, yet they enjoy it's benefits. Furthermore, they don't pay anything in development costs, saving themselves 20k per house as compared to new home buyers in most areas of the city. "

Maybe it's not that you're ignorant but an idiot. Just think about what you're saying. Are the buyers of these new homes getting a 20k refund when they sell the home? Just think it over. Actually scrap that, you'll get it wrong. The answer is that the development fee on existing homes were paid WHEN THEY WERE BUILT and the COST HAS BEEN WORKED INTO THE HOME FOR EVERY SALE SINCE THEN. I typed that in caps so that you might read it extra carefully.

Finally, to address "Lastly, please address my point about the city's falling tax rates combined with it's healthy increase in property tax revenue", that is due to the gradual phase in of MPAC's increases as determined back in 2007. For example, MPAC has increased their valuation of my home by 6.7% this year which more than offsets the tax decrease of 3.7%. The increase is based on past valuations and assumptions and does not take the current state of the market into account.