Vancouver is entering budget season and, like clockwork, the entire debate will collapse into a single number: the percentage increase in property taxes. That number becomes the headline, the talking point, the outrage, and ultimately the political weapon.
But behind all the noise, one basic question rarely gets asked:
What is Vancouver actually spending all this money on?
For a city that talks endlessly about affordability, efficiency, and transparency, it’s surprising how little clarity residents actually receive about where their money goes, why the budget keeps growing, and what value they are getting in return.
The operating budget has grown more than 90% in ten years, with no clear explanation why
Here is the part that matters most:
In 2015, Vancouver’s operating budget was about $1.22 billion. The draft 2025 budget is about $2.34 billion. That’s a 91% increase in less than a decade a trajectory shaped not by one council or one mayor, but by a series of financial decisions, staffing expansions, and structural choices made across multiple prior administrations and city managers over the last ten years.
Inflation doesn’t explain it.Population growth doesn’t explain it. Added responsibilities don’t explain it.
The only thing that explains an increase like this is inefficiency, bloat, and a lack of financial discipline inside City Hall.
While other Canadian cities have grown, Vancouver’s pace is in a league of its own:
- Toronto: ~65% increase over the same period
- Calgary: ~54%
- Montréal: ~49%
- Vancouver: 91%
And this is the part the public needs to understand:
These cities deliver more services than Vancouver does, yet they are increasing spending at a slower pace.
Vancouver’s growth isn’t a story of expanded responsibilities.It’s a story of costs rising faster than results.
Per resident, Vancouver actually spends more than Calgary and nearly as much as Toronto
When you break the numbers down by population, the pattern becomes even harder to defend.
- Calgary’s budget (approx. $5B) serves 1.6M people.
- Vancouver’s budget (approx. $2.34B) serves 680,000 people.
Vancouver spends significantly more per resident than Calgary, despite Calgary delivering more regional infrastructure and more municipal responsibilities.
And when compared to Toronto, a city with more than three times the population, more transit responsibility, more social services, and higher policing demands, Vancouver’s per-resident spend sits surprisingly close.
This is not efficiency.This is not good governance. This is a warning sign.
If spending has nearly doubled, where are the results?
A 91% increase in operating spending should come with equally visible improvements:
- Faster permit approvals
- Cleaner streets
- Better public safety
- More reliable frontline services
- Stronger infrastructure upkeep
- Clearly measurable service gains
But ask the average Vancouver resident if they feel like the city has doubled its service quality in a decade.
Most people will say no, because they don’t see it.
And it isn’t because the services don’t exist. It’s because the city does not connect spending to outcomes.The budget is presented as a financial document, not a clear explanation of what residents receive per dollar.
Toronto does this far better. Their budget documents explicitly link service costs to service results, so taxpayers can see what they’re paying for, what service levels they get, and what each department actually delivers. Vancouver simply doesn’t do this.
The debate has to shift from tax rates to efficient and transparency
This is where the current political conversation fails.
Arguing for “higher taxes” or “lower taxes” sounds ideological, but for most residents, the logic is simple:
Why would anyone fight to pay more if they don’t know where the money is going?
It’s the same as a household budget:
If your expenses go up every single year, and no one can explain why, you wouldn’t vote to spend more. You’d demand answers.
Before anyone talks about a 0%, 5%, or 9% tax increase, the city must answer the more basic question:
What exactly are residents paying for? And why does it cost this much?
We need one clear picture: the true cost of running Vancouver
Right now, the public is asked to make sense of a municipal budget, a Metro Vancouver levy, TransLink costs, utility fees, regional charges, downloaded responsibilities, and inflationary pressures, all fragmented across different agencies.
The average resident cannot reasonably piece this together.
Imagine if Vancouver published one annual chart:
“The True Cost of Running Vancouver” including City, Metro Vancouver, and TransLink costs in one place.
One number. One chart. One civic truth.
Cities like London, Sydney, and Toronto already do this because it’s the only way to ensure transparency, trust, and accountability.
Vancouver doesn’t need a bigger budget or a smaller one, it needs a clear one
This is the core issue.
Vancouver’s budget has nearly doubled in ten years. Residents don’t know what they’re paying for because the system doesn’t show them. The debate has become about tax percentages, when the real issue is structural clarity.
Budgets are moral documents, they show what a city values.
If Vancouver wants trust, if it wants meaningful civic engagement, and if it wants to have a real conversation about affordability, then transparency must come first.
Clarity is not partisan. Transparency is not ideological. Understanding how public money moves is the foundation of democracy.
Vancouver will always debate taxes. What we need now is the ability to debate them intelligently.
