City nearly finalizes 2018 budget: includes staff cuts, small tax bump

“We have our asphalt program fully in place. We are going to be repairing more streets and attacking potholes and we are building water reservoirs… we are improving sewer lines,” he said. “It is at 1.5 and the city is still working and growing.”

As a result of the cuts, however, three city jobs will be lost and another six positions will either remain vacant or not be filled in 2018, according to the mayor. Vacant roles include a planning technician, human resource consultant, and a summer financial student. Jobs being “reassigned” include a clerk-stenographer in planning and development, a corporate information manager, communications strategist, and a network support officer.

“Unfortunately, we did have to look at staff but people have to understand our biggest expense is staff. So when you have to cut, you can’t get around it,” he said. “Am I happy we have to cut peoples job? Absolutely not.” But Dionne added if the economy picks up, “at the end of the day, we can hire them back.”

He said how he made the Unions “what I thought was a fair offer, which would have eliminated any cuts” but it was “unsuccessful… so council had to take the bull by the horns and move ahead.”

The bargaining threshold for collective agreements with CUPE 882, 160 and out of scope staff was reinstated at one per cent at a cost of $134,000 in November.

Cutting jobs was a point of contention Monday night, resulting in Coun. Terra Lennox-Zepp voting against the final budget. Coun. Charlene Miller, citing many items “left on the table,” followed suit.

Lennox-Zepp was adamant about saving two positions – the clerk-stenographer and planning technician. She said in a $38 million budget, she didn’t “see the justification” of removing the clerk job at a cost of only $51,610. Not filling or removing positions from planning and development, she said, was shortsighted.

Coun. Don Cody, in a passionate plea, said, “no one likes to cut a person’s job… but there are times when we have to bite the bullet.”

Cody made note “we are not doing this because it is our fault” and pointed at the province’s 2017 austerity budget as for why the city had to tighten its belt. Furthermore, he said picking apart one or two line items you don’t like and holding up the whole budget “is not how we do things.”

“If we are going to be a team and make this city work the way a city should work properly, we all have to pull together,” Cody said. “I think we have done a good job here.”

The proposed budget identifies an operating surplus of $10.442 million. After $5.4 million is directed to fund capital projects, $314,000 to loan payments, roughly $5.5 million to reserves and $1 million is transferred from the 2017 fiscal surplus, the city will be left with a $151,910 surplus.

Because of this, nearly all additional funding requests — both internal and external — were denied and many “worthwhile” projects did not make it off the floor.

The main areas of savings for the city came through diverting $200,000 from the Public Transit fleet reserve fund and asking the police service to find another $200,000 in savings from an original half-a-million-dollar funding bump request. New revenues will come from various areas, but mainly through the city’s newly created impound lot.

In 2017, the province slashed its grant-in-lieu payments and revenue sharing, shorting municipal coffers by $2.5 million, and leaving the city in “crisis mode” this March. The city was forced to find $3.5 million in 2018.

When asked if he foresaw this happening again, the mayor said the province “can’t bring another budget in with any more cuts” as “they have hurt the province enough.”

“I don’t think they can cut anymore.”

Fiscal year 2019 is expected to be the year the province opens its funding avenues again. With a new leader of the Saskatchewan Party set to take the reins of the province in January, Dionne is “hopeful that whoever gets elected will go back to the grassroots and talk to us.”

The core of these talks for him would surround the funding formula and revenue sharing models for municipalities in the province. The province is expected to rejig its PST sharing formula after heavy lobbying from cities. Dionne is adamant on “leaving it alone” as now that provincial sales tax has been added to everything from car insurance to children’s clothes, money should be pouring in and in turn, flow down to the city.

Commercial taxes, utility bills to be tackled in 2018

On the list of priorities for the upcoming year, Dionne picked out two “big challenges” to tackle: utility bills and commercial tax rates.

“Our focus… will be on reducing commercial tax, which we know is high,” Dionne said. “I think we can find a fair balance and continue with the low rate of taxation.”

His comments come after a recent report from the Canadian Federation of Independent Businesses, showing Prince Albert had the largest gap between commercial and residential tax bills in the province.

While other cities have lowered commercial tax rates, to do so, Dionne said, they have shifted the burden over to its residents.

One last item to approve

The city will gather one last time before breaking for the holidays Tuesday night to pass a final bylaw.

The legislation is to allow an increase in the early ticket payment rate from $20 for $15, which in turn increases the set fine to $35. The hike, according to agenda documents, will generate $54,000 in revenue and show this amount is well below other cities in Saskatchewan and Alberta, where early payments start at $30.

Lennox-Zepp called the move simply a way of “reaching out for revenue” over actually dealing with parking problems. She and councillor Miller voted against allowing a third reading of the bylaw, forcing the special meeting.

tyler.marr@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @JournoMarr

by Tyler Marr

City nearly finalizes 2018 budget: includes staff cuts, small tax bump

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