Tax increase way to boost city: Asper

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'You can’t say you want something to happen and at the same time not be prepared to pay for it’ -- David Asper

WINNIPEG – More than 300 business people gave David Asper a standing ovation at a luncheon speech Thursday even though one of his suggested remedies to knock Winnipeg out of its doldrums is anathema to business people far and wide -- a tax increase.

In an impassioned speech that would have been a barn-burner if he were running for public office, Asper went through the list of self-loathing elements of the Winnipeg state of mind and made a plea for the city to break away from its traditional constraints.

He proposed a two per cent increase in the provincial sales tax, calling it a COD (Control Our Destiny) tax.

Such an increase would raise an additional $300 million per year that Asper said could go into a special fund exclusively dedicated to infrastructure projects, with full transparency regarding how it is spent.

"It could become an important turning point in our history," he said, suggesting a number of projects that could be done with a windfall like that, from sprucing up Portage Avenue to fixing the zoo to revitalizing the Exchange District. The tax would have a legislated sunset and would only be allowed to remain past that date if an overwhelming number of people voted to retain it in a referendum.

"Proponents of sound fiscal policy have no problem with consumption tax," he said. "The great criticism of the GST cuts was that it was the wrong tax to cut."

He said people who want to see the city grow and prosper will appreciate its effectiveness.

"You can't say you want something to happen and at the same time not be prepared to pay for it," he said.

He ran through a short, personal list of some of the city's recent setbacks -- no more polar bears at the zoo even though Manitoba is known as a polar bear habitat; decades of studies concerning the city's major sports arena; decades of studies about rapid transit systems with still no rapid transit; and the loss of its NHL franchise.

"There comes a time when the talking has to stop," he said. "We have to bust through the policy paralysis."

He said whenever he travels and is asked by people why Winnipeg, "I always unflinchingly respond, 'Why not Winnipeg?'"

His impassioned speech was a plea to the business community to overcome the negatives to get things done.

"Right now in this town to execute you have to stick your neck way out and be prepared to get it chopped off, publicly," he said. "You have to withstand stiff opposition, be prepared to grow a thick skin, keep your head down, take risks and be prepared to suffer, sometimes for years."

He said there are signs that attitudes in the city are changing, but there is still a long way to go.

"This is my greatest fear," he said. "It is an ominous syndrome that is holding the city back from achieving greatness -- that we are afraid of greatness, even worse that we don't think we deserve to be great. And even when we are great we're too modest to crow about it."

He said his own project that might create some civic pride -- building a new stadium for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers -- is going well.

Asper needs to build a retail development on the site of the current Bomber stadium to fund construction of the new stadium.

"We have a number of impressive tenants in the middle of due diligence right now," he said. "The reaction has been very positive and we are on track."

As for the future of the Asper family's controlling stake in Canwest Global Communications Corp., which is in the throes of a desperate debt crisis, he said, "Given what goes on on a daily basis it is a little hard to imagine the end."

"But I will tell you this... there is plenty of fight in the dog."

martin.cash@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition May 29, 2009 B4