By Andrew de Souza

Prince Albert had lowest per capita debt, taxes but highest wages

Feb 14, 2011 | 12:12 PM

paNOW’s stories about the City of Prince Albert’s employee wages, debt and taxes have generated much debate, both positive and negative.

Often we are asked to provide context and comparison and we understand that without that, numbers are meaningless and can be easily skewed.

paNOW compiled the 2009 numbers of Prince Albert, Moose Jaw, Saskatoon and Regina and present them here for your consideration.

(Author's note: Per capita measurements are based on Statistics Canada's 2006 Census numbers)

Prince Albert has lowest debt, taxes per capita

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Compared to the municipalities we looked at, Prince Albert has the lowest taxes and lowest debt per capita. 

In 2009, Prince Albert owed about $19 million or about $558 per person. That debt went to things such as upgrades to the water treatment plant and waste water treatment plant.Money also went to preparing the West Hill for development.

Earlier, paNOW had reported that the city’s debt was about $32 million. That figure is the city's debt to outside financial organizations but also includes money the city has ‘borrowed’ from its own reserves.

At the same time, Moose Jaw had a debt of $37 million or $1,169.93 per capita, which was the highest per capita debt of the communities we looked out. Following Moose Jaw was Saskatoon with a debt of $115 million or about $673.87 per capita then Regina, owing $106 million or $594.71 per capita.

 
PRINCE ALBERT
MOOSE JAW
REGINA
SASKATOON

Debt, total
$19,082,245.00
$37,560,000.00
$106,600,000.00
$115,341,000.00

Debt, per capita
$558.97
$1,168.00
$594.71
$570.04

Second lowest municipal taxes

Taxes in the city and the possibility of a substantial tax increase of around 10 per cent are a big issue in the city. But relatively speaking, the city still enjoys a low per capita municipal tax rate.

The city generates about $19.8 million from its municipal taxes, costing the population $580.24 per capita.

That was lower than Regina and Saskatoon with $828.63 and $673.87 per capita respectively. However, it was higher than Moose Jaw, which levied $483.04 per capita.

When comparing the tax levies of cities, we looked only at municipal taxes. Residents are also levied for School Boards and other projects that councils have the legal right to levy on a population.

 
PRINCE ALBERT
MOOSE JAW
REGINA
SASKATOON

Municipal Tax, total levy
$19,808,349
$15,521,000
$148,529,000.00
$136,350,000

Municipal Tax, levy per capita
$580.24
$483.04
$828.63
$673.87

Lowest police budget per capita

When it comes to police services in the province, only a few municipalities have their own city police force, the rest having contracted out the services of the RCMP.

The four cities we looked at maintain their own police service and of the four cities, Prince Albert has the lowest per capita budget.

In 2009, Prince Albert had a police budget of $9.9 million or $292.32 per capita. Moose Jaw had the highest per capita rate of $422.33 per capita, and a higher budget overall of $13.6 million.

Regina and Saskatoon were both middle of the road compared to the above cities with budgets of $61.3 million and $62 million respectively. On a per capita basis, Regina’s population pays $341.77 while Sasktoon pays $306.47.

It should be noted that Moose Jaw combines its fire and police budgets and that may therefore skew the comparison.

 
PRINCE ALBERT
MOOSE JAW
REGINA
SASKATOON

Municipal Tax, total levy
$9,979,210.00
$13,634,656
$61,261,000.00
$62,012,000

Municipal Tax, levy per capita
$292.32
$424.33
$341.77
$306.47

Highest per capita employee and councillor costs

While Prince Albert had among the lowest costs per capita in several categories, it had the highest per capita costs for councillors and staff.

paNOW compared the wages of city managers, police chiefs, deputy police chiefs, fire chiefs, public works managers, directors of finances and mayors.

We chose these for comparison because they were the only positions that were the same across all municipalities because cities across the province have different corporate structures. For instance, Prince Albert has both a solicitor and a clerk, but in other cities, one person performs both responsibilities and therefore gains a wage reflective of those two duties.

On a per capita basis, Prince Albert paid the highest for all positions except for fire chief and director of financial services.

This chart compares costs in totals and on a per capita basis.
 

JOB
PRINCE ALBERT
MOOSE JAW
REGINA
SASKATOON

City Manager, total
$170,204.85
$140,747.70
$229,435.00
$198,000.00

City Manager, per capita
$4.99
$4.38
$1.28
$0.98

Police Chief, total
$140,002.62
$119,688.58
$185,679.00
$176,667.00

Police Chief, per capita
$4.10
$3.72
$1.04
$0.87

Deputy Police Chief, total
$127,780.51
$110,532.09
$153,898.00
$157,753.00

Deputy Police Chief per capita
$3.74
$3.44
$0.86
$0.78

Fire Chief, total
$112,673.39
$113,510.11
$141,999.00
$154,404.00

Fire Chief, per capita
$3.30
$3.53
$0.79
$0.76

Director of Finance, total
$96,728.47
$110,725.75
$101,814.00
$154,404.00

Director of Finance, per capita
$2.83
$3.45
$0.45
$0.76

Director/Manager, Public Works, total
$104,794.36
$81,061.00
$81,526.00
$117,954.00

Director/Manager, Public Works, per capita
$3.07
$2.52
$0.45
$0.58

Mayor, total
$74,373.40
$44,206.47
$99,548.00
$110,957.00

Mayor, per capita
$2.18
$1.38
$0.56
$0.55

There are many ways to compare cities, but paNOW felt these were the most appropriate given the comments we've recieved on various stories we've published.

paNOW believes that transparency of public institutions is a requisite in a functioning democracy. If there's other areas you'd like us to explore, let us know and we'll do our best to look into it — keeping in mind that it's not an easy task to locate documents, interpret them, compile the information and present it for public consumption.

adesouza@panow.com