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That same year, the Liberals created Metrolinx — a regional transportation agency that would be tasked with implementing and managing Presto.

The Liberals also made gas-tax funding contingent upon municipalities including adopting and using Presto.

You already know how this story will end.

By 2010, the City of Toronto was threatening to pull out of Presto. The program ran into a series of delays and setbacks.

By 2012, former Ontario auditor Jim McCarter called Presto “seriously flawed” and criticized ballooning costs – a consequence of the Metrolinx ordering numerous changes to the fixed-price system the province ordered.

McCarter estimated the cost of Presto could hit $700 million.

In the years that followed, the system got built and fare gates were installed in GO and subway stations, on public transit vehicles. But it’s been plagued with reliability issues and ongoing delays – the most recent this week when the TTC suspended Presto fare-gate installation over mechanical and software issues.

This in microcosm is the key to what’s wrong with the Ontario Liberal government, a government that has tripled public spending and doubled debt without a commiserate increase in public service.

Presto was a marketing slogan, like the “Fairness” slogan Kathleen Wynne tosses around now.

The Liberals could have contemplated a cheaper, tried-and-true alternative, but handed the project over and failed to oversee implementation. It’s become a pattern of mismanagement.

Health care, hydro and other public programs are in crisis precisely because Ontario has a marketing team, not a government in power that takes the provision of public services seriously.

But come June 7, “Presto!” They could be gone.