We sent the following letter to Mr. Andrew Coyne today. We recently listened to his interviews about the “Crisis in Canadian Democracy” and it related to equalization fairness for us. Here is a YouTube link for a presentation by Mr. Coyne (he is the first speaker in this video): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aG6ulAPnFO4 We will let you know if we hear back from Mr. Andrew Coyne. Here is our letter to him today: Dear Mr. Coyne. We reach out to you today and ask for just a moment of your time. We are a group Called the NSEF (Nova Scotians for Equalization Fairness) in Sydney, Nova Scotia who has been fighting for fairness from our provincial government for over 30 years with regards to equalization. Mr. Coyne, we noticed that you have ties and connections to Manitoba and that province is similar in that it receives equalization and yet is plagued with high property taxation in rural communities. Here in Nova Scotia, the provincial government receives this year $3.465 billion in equalization and will only dole out $30 million, province-wide, to address our fiscal capacity issue related to property taxes in struggling municipalities (one of the 5 categories that make up the payment). This $30 million has been capped for decades now and was capped when the total transfer was less than $1 billion. Here in the CBRM (Cape Breton Regional Municipality) which is the second largest municipality in the province with a population of around 110,000 residents, we pay almost double the property taxation than in downtown Halifax or the HRM. Equalization is quite clear in section 36 of the Canadian Constitution Act of 1982 and the intended purpose of the payment is so residents can live to a Canadian standard without excessive taxation. We listened to your recent interviews on “The Crisis of Democracy in Canada” and we are having much difficulty in getting our Members of Parliament (we have 2 Liberal members) to secure answers in Ottawa on several questions, such as the legal justification to send this transfer to a receiving province “unconditionally” and, why the provincial government is exempt from following the Constitution of Canada. Some residents in our municipality feel that the Nova Scotia Provincial Government is keeping our region of the province in a “poor fiscal capacity” situation intentionally. Every year we see the transfer increase by hundreds of millions of dollars and yet the CBRM is faced with high property taxation and extremely poor and failing infrastructure. The CBRM or Sydney was the economic engine of the Maritimes at one time. The steel plant closed, and the mines were shut down and sealed shut. Since then, no effort has been made by any level of government to develop sustainable industry here as the politicians figured out that when our region was poor, more funding was sent via equalization that would never reach us. We have lived this nightmare for 30 years now while we watch the HRM or Halifax grow so fast that it looks different every time we visit. We pay too much tax and lack development and opportunities. We hope you can give us some advice on how we can hold our politicians accountable for this grave injustice to the residents of rural Nova Scotia. The CBRM’s commercial tax rate is driving investment away from our municipality at one of the highest in the country. Governments are refusing to be accountable and transparent about where they are spending this funding and just by visual reference, it appears that most of the funding is being spent in the capital region, an area with a strong fiscal capacity and low property taxation. Equalization was designed to be a helping hand, not a welfare trap. Thank you, Mr. Coyne, for taking the time to read this letter and we do hope to hear back from you with any advice you are willing to offer the NSEF. Regards, Rev. Dr. Albert Maroun on behalf of The Nova Scotians for Equalization Fairness.