” Better Ballots aims to explore options that deliver a better result when we go to the polls. Should there be term limits, municipal parties, or a “ranked ballot” where you place your first, second, third, fourth choice from among the candidates? Or other options? … Dave Meslin and a group of citizens are pushing an initiative to improve the way we elect our city councillors. ”

Send your ideas to Dave, check out www.whorunsthistown.to, and read the full article from the Sept 22 Toronto Star.

After a recent trip to the Home Hardware in Cabbagetown, I discovered out there is a separate tax in Ontario for pesticides!

Try searching the official provincial government website for “eco-fee” and I doubt that you’ll find any info about this fee. Similarly, this Ministry of the Environment webpage makes no mention of the “electronics tax”, introduced in April 2009. You have to do some more Internet sleuthing to come up with these websites

• www.stewardshipontario.ca runs the Municipal Hazardous or Special Waste (MHSW) program
• its imaginatively named “Big Brother” is www.ontarioelectronicstewardship.ca
• The URL for their “sister” website for the Ontario Tire Stewardship is more succinct www.ontariots.ca

All of these “stewardship” websites contain the disclaimer “none of the fees collected will go to government; therefore it is not a tax.” Kinda difficult to follow their logic here: we pay tax for public services such as health care, garbage collection, water etc. But if the province decides to outsource the collection of used electronics (or tires), why is it no longer called a tax? Lucky us; we get to pay GST + PST on top of these fees.

Just how much ?

• fees for electronics
• the Municipal Hazardous or Special Waste (MHSW) program “fees” aren’t as easy to find
• No idea what the amount of the tire tax is; who cares. So far, bicycle tires aren’t taxed yet (at least, I don’t think so, but who really knows for sure, the mysterious “stewards” are in charge.)