Your Tax Bill, City Contracts, and Who Steers Council: My Answers for CCAL

Concerned Citizens Association of London (CCAL) put the hard questions on the table: property taxes that keep climbing, contracts residents only see after a Freedom of Information fight, procurement that can clear millions without a council vote, and whether staff or voters set the direction at City Hall. Those are the fights I am running on in Ward 9.

Each block below quotes CCAL’s full statement and question exactly as they sent them, followed by my full answer in my own words.

All fifteen questions, and my answers

Londoners have watched elected officials override the clearly expressed will of voters on major projects. Council ignored the public vote against the BRT, and the city is now on the hook for a bus rapid transit system that has ballooned to $454 million — up more than 50% from the original estimate, with the local taxpayer share nearly tripling. The costly bike-lane network followed the same pattern.

Will you commit to following the clearly expressed will of voters on major projects — even when it conflicts with activist pressure — and how will you determine what the majority of your ward actually wants, rather than listening only to the loudest voices?

That is my main goal. I opposed the BRT back in 2018 before it started ballooning past what residents were told to expect. Council voted it through anyway on its own authority, despite widespread public opposition. I’ve also presented arguments, based on the London Plan, opposing high-density developments that are unsuitable and unwanted in Ward 9.

I built ward9.online with a public concern tracker so residents can write in and see my answer go up publicly. I draft policy the same way: my proposed PACT bylaw has been open on GitHub since day one, allowing anyone to see the entire history and suggest changes.

If elected, I’d like to build an official version of the concern tracker, with verified-resident logins (allowing optional anonymity). Activist groups can organize and lobby all they want, but I represent Ward 9 residents. Not activists.

Londoners have been hit with repeated property tax increases that far outpace inflation — a compounded tax levy increase of roughly 26% over four years — driven by overspending and frivolous spending on non-essential items. Council has shown it will not discipline itself without a hard rule.

Will you support a binding policy that any property tax increase above the rate of inflation requires a public referendum, and what specific spending lines would you cut first to stay under that ceiling?

I would, but my own standard already goes further: I won’t support any property tax increase during my term, for any reason, not just increases above inflation.

I’ve also drafted the Pay Accountable to City Taxpayers bylaw, which permanently cuts council pay for any levy increase at all through this whole coming term, then only for increases above inflation after that.

On specific spending cuts, the Climate Change Reserve Fund already has about $967,000 sitting unallocated, so I’d reject any push to restore its contributions to the old $1 million a year until that backlog clears. The Community Arts Investment Program, about $800,000 a year, ranks below essential services like roads, water, and safety, and it’s the kind of discretionary spending that goes first if push comes to shove.

A councillor’s sworn duty is to represent citizens and manage their money responsibly. That requires real financial literacy — reading budgets, understanding debt, and prioritizing spending. Too many elected officials arrive with no financial training and treat the job as a platform for grand, top-down social projects that belong in provincial or federal politics.

What is your actual experience reading budgets and financial statements, and will you commit to ongoing financial training as a condition of holding office?

I took a first year Business course at Western University, and I’ve also kept my books and filed my own taxes since I started Matt Millar Technology Solutions, so I’m used to reading real numbers and acting on them myself.

I’ve been familiarizing myself with the City’s budget documents and procedures too, including the multi-year budget update and the reasoning and calculations behind council’s own pay resolution, because you can’t hold anyone accountable to numbers you haven’t read and understood yourself. If I ever need financial training beyond that, I’m open to it.

Budgets used to be examined line by line, every year. The current model approves a multi-year budget that is difficult to amend, and the promised savings have not materialized — instead, Londoners have seen some of the largest tax increases in the city’s history.

Will you vote to reinstate a full annual line-by-line review of the entire budget, rather than the current practice of approving a multi-year plan with only minor amendments?

Yes. A full line-by-line annual review is sorely needed.

While a multi-year budget has a real planning benefit for major capital projects and long-term commitments, approving one and then waving through minor amendments for years skips real oversight, and Londoners have still seen a cumulative tax increase of more than 25% over this multi-year budget.

I’d keep multi-year planning for the parts that actually need multi-year timelines, and require every line of the operating budget to go through genuine annual review and public disclosure again. If a line item can’t be defended out loud every year, it shouldn’t coast through on the multi-year plan’s convenience.

Elected officials have been publicly smeared, subjected to unsubstantiated ethics complaints that would not survive a court of law, and — in the case of the “Whole of Community Response” homelessness planning — told by staff not to attend vital meetings. City staff and outside groups, including non-Canadian-funded organizations, have increasingly attempted to steer council toward decisions that serve their own interests rather than citizens’.

Will you commit to rein in staff members who overstep their boundaries and attempt to steer elected officials, repeatedly re-frame their precise questions in council, or attack them through activist groups — and will you publicly name whoever is doing it?

A major theme of my campaign is the problem of councillors deferring to staff over their constituents. Staff work for council, not the other way around.

I’ll push back in public any time a report dodges the actual question asked or steers council toward staff’s preferred outcome instead of answering it, and I already support publishing contracts, invoices, and reports proactively so residents can see the pattern themselves rather than take my word for it.

On naming individuals: I’ll do it to the extent the law allows, when conduct is actually documented and warrants it, but not as a standing accusation against staff before any facts are established. Naming someone before the facts are in only trades one unfairness for another.

London’s budgets have been infiltrated by ideological frameworks with no measurable outcomes — ESG methods that major banks have now largely abandoned, and DEI hiring policies that can pass over the best-qualified candidate because of the wrong skin colour. A city must hire the best people at the best price, not satisfy a fad.

Will you commit to hiring and contracting based on qualifications and merit, and will you publicly oppose any hiring policy that weighs an applicant’s race, sex, or ideology over their competence?

Yes. The City should hire and contract with the best person or firm for the job, at the best price and service for taxpayers. I oppose weighing race, sex, or any other identity category over qualifications and results, for anyone, in any direction. Sorting people by group instead of judging them on their own merits is the problem, whichever group ends up favoured. ESG frameworks in procurement and investment get judged by that standard too: if a methodology doesn’t produce a measurably better outcome for London taxpayers than the plain merit-based alternative, it doesn’t belong in a City contract or budget line. Hire and contract on competence and results, and publish the criteria so residents can see the City is actually following its own rule.

London spent $1.3 million on the Housing Collaborative Initiative — software that was never used — with $933,000 going to a single outside consultant. Council went years without meaningful updates while the bills quietly mounted. The London Economic Development Corporation receives $2.3 million annually under a purchase-of-services agreement that is not put to tender. Other organizations receiving millions for homelessness work resist even basic public reporting. Taxpayers should not need a Freedom of Information request — often answered with redactions — to see their own spending.

Will you ensure all contracts, invoices, and spending details are proactively published and accessible to council without an FOI request — and what reporting frequency will you demand from every funded agency?

I’ll push for it. Since it takes a council majority, no single councillor can ensure that outcome outright, but I’ll vote for it and keep pushing until it happens. Contracts, invoices, and spending details should be published proactively, and not surrendered one redacted page at a time after a Freedom of Information request.

On the multi-city Housing Collaborative Initiative, London paid a consultant roughly $800,000, and residents only learned the details because reporters kept pulling the thread. I’d require every agency receiving City funding to report quarterly with real numbers attached to real deliverables, published where any resident can find it.

Any vendor contract that requires basic facts like cost, scope, or performance to stay confidential is a contract I’d vote against, and any privacy impact assessment should be public before council votes on it.

Measurable accountability is the difference between a well-run city and a money pit. A lack of clear metrics leads to frivolous spending, possible corruption, decaying core services, and a public that stops trusting — and stops voting for — its elected officials.

Will you require every department to publish clear, measurable performance metrics tied to spending, and what consequence will you impose when a department fails to meet them?

Again, not something I can unilaterally require, but I’d like every department to publish clear metrics tied to what it actually spends. Right now, the pattern runs the other way.

London’s Climate Change Reserve Fund held $1.192 million by the end of 2024, with only about $225,000 actually reaching a project and roughly $967,000 sitting unallocated against a real project backlog, and there’s still no clear public reporting tying that fund’s spending to a measured result.

On consequences: a department that misses its published metrics should have that specific line frozen or cut at the next budget and not quietly carried forward. I won’t pretend that a councillor can fire a City manager directly, but I can vote the budget line, and I will vote it down when the numbers don’t back up the spending.

London’s senior management ranks have expanded faster than the services they deliver, while taxpayers fund salaries, benefits, and pensions that exceed what the private sector earns for comparable work.

How will you reduce the excessive bureaucracy whose compensation goes beyond private-sector earnings — and how many management positions do you believe are redundant, with what specific reductions?

City compensation, pay and benefits together, should match an equivalent private-sector role. A Fraser Institute study from January 2026 found Ontario’s public sector already carries roughly a 7.9% wage premium over comparable private-sector work, on top of far better pension and job security odds.

I won’t invent a specific headcount number without a real organizational review. That’s exactly the kind of unaccountable guess that should invite skepticism. What I can commit to is voting for an independent management-structure audit in year one, with its findings and recommended reductions published in full, then voting the specific reductions that audit actually supports. A number invented without that work behind it wouldn’t survive contact with reality, and Londoners deserve better than a guess dressed up as a plan.

A city cannot function without public order. Police are increasingly forced to deal with “revolving door” criminals and “free of fear” policies that may hide offenders rather than hold them accountable.

How do you think policing can be made more effective while dealing with “revolving door” criminals and “free of fear” policies that hide offenders?

The revolving door for repeat offenders comes from bail, sentencing, and Crown discretion, which are all provincial and federal matters.

Council does control the City’s Free of Fear Services for All Policy, which blocks staff from reporting a resident’s immigration status to police or CBSA. I oppose selective enforcement of any law. If there is a problem with a law on the books, the law should be amended. Until that happens, the law must be enforced.

To me, “free of fear” should be the natural state for law-abiding Londoners in their communities. Unfortunately, many don’t even feel safe in their own homes. My main law and order concern is ensuring police have the will and capacity to act on pervasive and ongoing crime affecting Ward 9 residents, like frequent overnight break-ins. I will also push our four of seven Police Services Board appointees to make recurring hotspots a stated priority.

“Safer supply” policies have seen taxpayer-funded drugs distributed for unobserved consumption, alongside open drug use, encampments, and a visible decline in public safety. Recovery and treatment must come first, and council must add pressure on the provincial and federal governments.

Do you support an end to “safer supply” being distributed for unobserved consumption by addicts, as well as open drug use — and will you support recovery programs and enforcement against open drug use and encampments that threaten public safety?

My principle is simple: nothing illegal should be permitted in any taxpayer-funded facility, or anywhere in London.

Shelters: this council considered, and in August 2026 pulled back from, a proposal that would have stopped shelters from denying entry over drug possession. I’d have opposed that proposal from the start. Drug use is already banned, at least on paper, in every shelter; I want that made a clear, permanent, city-wide rule, not left to each operator’s discretion.

Safer supply is a provincial program, not something council sets, but diversion is real: London pharmacies have been documented dispensing take-home doses that get resold on the street. That’s trafficking, already illegal, and I support council’s own push for the province to review it.

Open drug use is already illegal, too. I expect it enforced everywhere, rather than tolerated or ignored. Encampments should be cleared; public spaces should stay open for every Londoner.

City procurement must be open and fair. Taxpayers have the right to see every bid, every winning price, and every conflict of interest — before the contract is signed, not after. Too often, contracts favour the recipients while placing an undue burden on taxpayers.

Will you support a full review of procurement policies to ensure contracts are fair and do not unduly burden taxpayers while favouring recipients — and will you commit to publishing all bids, evaluations, and awards proactively, with mandatory conflict disclosure, without requiring an FOI request?

I’ll push for both. A single councillor can’t rewrite procurement policy alone, but I’ll vote for a full review and keep pushing until competitive bidding is the default and the paperwork is public before the money moves.

Right now, staff can approve contracts up to six million dollars without a council vote, and council never even sees a report on anything under $133,800. Below that line, taxpayers only learn what happened if someone files a Freedom of Information request, and even then pages can come back redacted. Bids, evaluations, awards, and conflict disclosures should be published proactively, not dug out after the fact.

Any vendor deal that needs basic facts like cost, scope, or conflicts kept quiet is a deal I’d vote against.

Organizations like the Federation of Canadian Municipalities and the Association of Municipalities of Ontario lobby for agendas — climate mandates, density targets, and social policy — that local voters never asked for, while councils pay membership fees for the privilege of being lobbied.

How familiar are you with the programs pushed by the FCM and AMO, and how will you evaluate their cost/benefit — not just in city taxes, but in the provincial and federal tax dollars they also consume?

I know the Federation of Canadian Municipalities and the Association of Municipalities of Ontario as municipal associations. I haven’t worked through every program either one promotes, and I’ll be honest about that.

But I will judge the cost and benefit of what they ask of London. FCM channels large federal climate and housing dollars through funds like the Green Municipal Fund, with project rules and often requiring London taxpayer funds. AMO lobbies the province on housing supply, growth infrastructure, and homelessness spending, while warning that health and social costs get shifted onto property taxes. If an agenda brings climate targets, density templates, or social-policy packages decided somewhere else, I will meet it with a heaping dose of skepticism and ask what it costs in city taxes and in provincial and federal dollars, what outcome it claims, and whether Londoners benefit from it.

Association pressure does not shape my decisions.

London has signed onto international frameworks — the Global Covenant of Mayors, UN-aligned “human rights” initiatives, and global NGO agendas — that impose obligations, reporting burdens, and data-sharing commitments on the city without any mandate from local voters. These commitments are made by staff and a handful of councillors, then treated as binding on everyone.

How will you ensure that offshore-funded groups do not exert undue influence over London’s budget, the privacy of residents’ data, or commitments that conflict with Canadian law — and that they cannot bypass local control through well-organized campaigns such as the highly controversial “Climate Emergency”? And will you support withdrawing from organizations that push agendas contrary to Londoners’ expressed wishes?

Londoners decide for London. I will reject outright any attempt by offshore-funded groups, international frameworks, or global NGO campaigns to steer our budget, grab residents’ data, or lock the City into commitments that conflict with Canadian law. Labels like a “climate emergency” do not get a free pass on spending or policy. Every dollar and every data share still needs a local case, a cost, and a benefit to Ward 9 residents and all Londoners.

I will also support withdrawing from organizations that push agendas contrary to what Londoners have asked for. If a membership mainly exports decision-making and reporting burdens while importing priorities set somewhere else, it does not belong. Local control is not optional.