Motion fails; City Council to revisit 2019 proposed budget

City councillors will hold a special meeting of council later this month after a motion to pass the 2019 budget was defeated Monday night.

Following two days of discussions last month over everything from the cost of new hand dryers at the Kinsmen Water Park to the city’s multi-million dollar police budget, all that was left was to formally approve the 2019 numbers. But the motion was defeated at council’s regular meeting this week, leaving some councillors visibly frustrated.

Ward 5 Coun. Dennis Ogrodnick asked for a recorded vote on the issue and urged fellow councillors to support the 2019 budget document. The vote ended in a four to four tie, which is not enough to pass.

Council will now revisit the issue at a special meeting Dec. 20.

Ward 2 Coun. Terra Lennox-Zepp was one of those who voiced her discontent with the budget at the council meeting, saying it doesn’t do enough to plan for savings long term. Lennox-Zepp cited several reasons for her vote against the motion to approve, including council’s decision not to fund $60,000 in LED lighting upgrades at the Kinsmen Arena. The money for the lighting improvements was expected to be recouped within three to five years.

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Lennox-Zepp also questioned council’s decision not to go ahead with a new salt and sand storage building or fuel storage tanks at the Municipal Service Centre and took issue with the decision to move money from the roadways fund to the general fund to offset the 2019 tax increase. She said the money is supposed to be used for road improvements.

“I found this budget to be short-sighted,” Lennox-Zepp said. “If we did a better job of watching for future cost-saving measures, we would be able to decrease the taxes that we have to implement in future years.”

Ward 6 Coun. Blake Edwards said there has been plenty of discussion on the proposed numbers and while he doesn’t agree with the decision on every line item, the 2019 budget is a good one overall and offered something for families, seniors and youth.

“To not support that over certain individual line items in there, to me, it’s not what should happen,” Edwards told paNOW. “I thought we came to a good balance … we all gave a little bit and that’s what’s necessary, that’s a team that does that.”

Mayor Greg Dionne said it is frustrating another meeting will have to be held on the issue.

“We have a $100 million budget, and you don’t vote because of a $60,000 item? Boy, I don’t know why you ran for council,” he said. “I thought we did a great job this year. It went along quite smoothly and then we get these personal ward attacks, as I call them, on the budget.”

Ward 4 Coun. Don Cody also spoke in support of the budget document, saying while nobody wants to see tax increases, the new budget does “very well for every sector of society.”

The 2019 budget calls for a tax increase of 3.9 per cent.

Charlene.tebbutt@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @CharleneTebbutt