THE CANADIAN MUNICIPALITIES

THE CANADIAN MUNICIPALITIES
INTRODUCTION
Canada is a large state which has many municipalities or cities. The size of a municipality is determined by the size of the community or the size of population living there. The bigger the size of the community, the more issues it has in relation to development and also in terms of requiring more funds from the government. For example, the needs of small cities like Monte Jolie, Whistler and Parry sound which have a population of less than 10000 people, may be less than the needs of cities like Montreal and Toronto which have a population of over a million people. Needs also are determined by whether the city is in urban areas or in rural areas (The Strategic Counsel, 2008). Urban cities tend to be more demanding in terms of infrastructure, education, health care and other social amenities due to their large population sizes as opposed to the rural cities which may only be experiencing shortages in infrastructure.
An interview conducted in several cities of Canada reveals that the major issues or problems experienced in most of the cities include: Community safety, policing and insecurity, lack of clean water, lack of proper and adequate housing, inadequate roads and poor road maintenance and also lack of safe and convenient social amenities. All the municipalities however are in agreement that the local municipalities are insufficiently funded by the government hence cannot be able to solve these problems (The Governments major source of revenue being taxes) (Gad, 2009). The interview reveals that 30% of the population believe that the municipalities receive just over a 10% of the total government revenue from tax while 49% believe that the municipalities are allocated just below 10% of all the government revenues. This is believed to be much lower than what the municipalities need in order to curb the most pressing issues (The Strategic Counsel, 2008).
The interview also reveals that a greater percentage of the people living in different municipalities believe that the major issue facing them is infrastructure and that the municipality together with the federal government should work on it as soon as possible.
INFRASTRUCTURE IN THE CITY OF MONTREAL, TORONTO AND VANCOUVER
Infrastructure in this case refers to public transits, roads, water systems and also sewerage systems. 90% of the total population in Canada believes that infrastructure is a big issue facing almost all the cities. The big question here is whether the federal government should fund infrastructure from taxes, transfer some financial support from other provincial governments or reduce its spending on other cities and other municipalities (Freeman, 2010). From the interview, the majority feel that infrastructure should be funded by provision or transfer of funds from other states and provinces. Montreal, Vancouver and Toronto are cities which have been facing infrastructural shortcomings or issues for a long period of ti...