Calgary’s mayor, Jyoti Gondek, just had her worst month since being elected two years ago. It was not just her tone-deaf handling of the lighting of a menorah. It was also her failure to control Calgary’s budget, which has resulted in eye-popping property-tax hikes for next year. All this happened to a mayor with Biden-like approval ratings near 35 per cent — before this past month.

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Mayor Gondek has stumbled along since Day 1. Setting the “climate change crisis” as her top priority when she became mayor, it seemed to escape her notice that Calgary’s biggest issue was a collapse in the tax base that would leave a deep hole in the city’s finances. Assessments on non-residential property dropped 16 per cent from 2018 to 2022. With many commercial buildings standing empty, especially downtown, the city no longer has a cash cow to fund its services.

But not even that glaring oversight compares with her decisions this past month. Calgary’s budget is in a shambles, with a 7.8 per cent increase in residential property taxes coming next year, likely twice the rate of inflation. In fairness, the increase is partly due to the mayor’s and city council’s sensible decision to shift more of the burden from non-residential to residential payers. The non-residential rate is 3.8 times the residential rate and many businesses can’t cope. A $10-million property incurs $220,000 in taxes, which is almost half the $500,000 profit it would earn with a typical five per cent return.

Even despite the switchover, however, non-residential property owners still face an increase of 3.8 per cent in property taxes in 2024. The fundamental fiscal problem is Calgary’s inability to control spending, which is expected to rise another 7.4 per cent in 2024 after an increase of 18 per cent over the past two years. Granted, inflation and population have also jumped. But in 2024 dollars per capita spending will be $3,480 — up $250 from 2022. What the city needs is a cut in per capita real spending, not a large hike in property taxes.

Not surprisingly, politicians are even more out of favour than usual in Calgary. Higher oil prices and lots of new businesses are a positive, but legacy financial problems, safety concerns and empty downtown offices are big negatives that seemingly won’t go away. Jarred by federal support for Toronto, the mayor is taking the time-honoured route of blaming the feds. But even if she does squeeze funding out of Ottawa, it won’t do much good if all the money goes down the spending rabbit hole.

The menorah stumble was a straw that would have broken any camel’s back. Mayor Gondek made a political scene with an open letter accusing organizers of last-minute changes to a program “in support of Israel.” Yes, the event advertisement for the Jewish community states clearly “Am Yisrael Chai” (the nation of Israel lives) and follows with “Unity, supporting Israel, Jewish pride.”

But an in-touch politician would know that Hanukkah is a celebration of a revolt two millennia ago against Greek tyranny that practiced “cultural genocide” by forcibly converting unassimilated Jews to Hellenism. The land of Israel is part and parcel of Jewish heritage, so support for Israel is key in many Jewish celebrations. Every Sabbath, a prayer for Israel is read at most synagogues, with the words “Heavenly Father, Israel’s Rock and Redeemer, bless the State of Israel, the first flowering of our redemption.”

Gondek confuses matters by stating “the menorah lighting has always been in support of the Calgary Jewish community,” not “support for Israel.” If a mayor really wanted to support the Calgary Jewish community, the most important thing she could say is that she supports the existence of Israel — unlike Hamas, which wishes to kill Jews, as they repeatedly say, even today.

I don’t think Gondek is antisemitic, but her actions effectively isolate the Jewish community. She even seems to suggest the event organizers were conniving. To her credit, she did say there is no side to choose when “terrorists incite violence by murdering innocent Israelis.” But she seems not to understand that the security threat to Israel is much different since Oct. 7. Her statement that “eradicating Hamas must come in a different form than mass casualties” is essentially empty. What is her alternative?

The terrible nature of any war is that civilians are killed and wounded. The key is to minimize the harm as much as possible, which can be done by evacuation or by armies separating themselves from civilian populations, which Hamas refuses to do. Would the mayor have supported the 2017 allied bombing of Mosul, Iraq, to eradicate ISIL, even though it led to civilian deaths estimated at anywhere from 9,000 (Associated Press) to 40,000 (The Independent)? It was a tough decision, but the allies rooted out ISIL to provide security in years to come.

Event organizers were not asking her to take sides. One can support both Israel and a peaceful co-existence of Israelis and Palestinians. A true leader at a celebration would get up to remind people that both sides lose when there is no peace.

Yes, it has been a very bad month for Calgary’s mayor. Voters won’t be happy with their pockets being picked over. Nor with a mayor who divides rather than brings people together.

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