Issues and Opportunities

Carling is home to a number of demographic groups that deserve to have their views and needs represented on the council—young working families and retirees, those who are financially secure and those who are just getting by, new residents and residents with deep family roots. Each of these groups can be found within what has traditionally been referred to as seasonal and full-time communities.

Each group will have some distinct priorities and expectations that our councillors should understand and represent, and all will have a number of common interests too. Get Out the Vote Carling wishes to hear from you and asks that you share your views, concerns, and ideas through the Get Involved section of our website.

Visibility Into Council’s Actions and Engagement of Residents

• Enhance the visibility of matters before Council and Council’s deliberations and decisions by live-streaming all meetings as well as recording meetings for later viewing at any time via the Township’s website or YouTube as done by Seguin, Parry Sound, and many other Ontario municipalities.
• Improve and broaden the ability of seasonal residents to gain representation on Council by re-instituting the option of council meetings via video conference. (Note: Council only implemented this during the pandemic and has now eliminated it, which severely restricts participation and access.)
• Engage the community on a regular and frequent basis in determining the Township’s priorities and assessing Council’s conduct by actively seeking input, ideas, and feedback from residents through newsletters, online forums, and in-person meetings throughout the community.

Taxes and Value to Taxpayers

Did you know?

• That Carling has a much larger tax base than comparable municipalities (60% larger) and yet has the highest tax rate? We should be paying much lower taxes per property because we have more properties to tax and fewer facilities, roads, and bridges to maintain than places like Whitestone and McKellar– and fewer services too. Refer to Comparative Table of Tax Burdens and Ratepayer Value
• That in total, Carling collects $5.7 MILLION per year in taxes while McKellar collects $3.7 MILLION  and Whitestone, $3.1 MILLION to maintain essentially the same amount of infrastructure and services.  
• That, over the past two terms of Council, the municipal portion of your tax bill (which is 78% of the total bill)  has gone from $337 per $100,000 of property value in 2014 to $536 per $100,000 of property value in 2022, a 59% increase in eight years (or a 7% increase every year on average).

Other Issues and Needs Raised by Residents

We have been gathering input from residents over the past several weeks. Here are some other issues and opportunities that have been raised so far. Please send us your own ideas, concerns, and observation. We will summarize residents’ input regularly and provide updates to you in this section of our website and through emails, so please be sure to include your email address when using our feedback form.

• Highway 559 continues to degrade and will now not be repaired until 2024 or later. UPDATE – Repairs have begun.
• Water access residents feel as if they get very little value for their taxes.
• On the other hand, some year-round, inland residents feel as though the waterfront and seasonal residents get all the benefits. Clearly, there is a serious lack of two-way communication between the Council and the community.
• Building and zoning codes appear to be inconsistently and inequitably applied.
• Environmental protection and by-law enforcement
• The council needs to be more effectively engaged with upper levels of government, especially the Province, to ensure that Carling obtains the support and resources to which it is entitled and that commitments are delivered as promised (like repairs to Highway 559).
• The Township should advocate more effectively on issues affecting large groups in the community (such as Hydro One’s elimination of seasonal rates and Georgian Bay water quality initiatives).
• A large part of the Township’s annual budget goes to organizations in the Town of Parry Sound. Our Council should provide more leadership and direction on the use of those funds to improve cost-efficiency and enhance the quality and level of service delivery from these important cultural and community organizations (library, long-term care homes, museum, new pool).
• Concerns about what is happening with the new Carling Bay “Park”
• Sunday Gun Hunting rules
• Availability of tradespeople in the community
• Affordable housing
• More meaningful minutes from council meetings, easier to follow and fewer closed-door decisions with no disclosure
• Road repairs and maintenance appear to be inconsistent across the township
• Road speed limits and enforcement
• Parking without tags