|
Kincardine council is looking at a difficult budget next year as
it attempts to pare down its capital and operating figures by
$800,000.
Chief administrative officer John deRosenroll brought this dismal
news to council in committee-of-the-whole last night (Oct. 21).
He said if the provincial government removes the one-time
assistance from the Ontario Municipal Partnership Fund, Kincardine
would lose $621,100 in funding. This would mean a 12-per-cent tax
increase in 2010 unless council does something to mitigate the
financial impact, he said.
To begin with a zero-based budget for next year, council would have
to decrease the capital budget by 9.4 per cent ($500,000), and the
operating by 6.5 per cent ($346,008). Council has also dipped into
its tax mitigation reserve fund to the tune of $674,725 for this
year's budget, said deRosenroll, which means a loss of $224,908.33
for the 2010 budget as well.
"Why are we losing this much money?" asked councillor Randy Roppel.
"Is it because of all the grants we've been receiving?"
In 2005, the former Community Reinvestment Fund was replaced by the
Ontario Municipal Partnership Fund in order to update the
calculation formula for provincial funding, said deRosenroll. The
new fund includes grants for policing, rural municipalities,
stabilization, and farm assessment.
Deputy mayor Laura Haight said the funding fails to recognize the
basic costs in rural Ontario. "The cost to plow one kilometre of
road is the same but rural municipalities do not have as large
a population base to pay for it," she said. "The province wanted to
get to the point where it had a stable funding formula. But I don't
think they can do that. Rural Ontario needs a basic subsidy."
She added that Kincardine should review its reserves and the
sustainability of those funds. "We need to find out what is an
appropriate level of money to set aside," she said.
Haight also noted that the three municipalities in Bruce County with
the highest tax rates have not been hit by the reduction in
provincial funding. "Is the government trying to equalize the tax
rates across the county?" she asked.
|
Roppel asked if other key issues will be considered by
council in next year's budget, such as drawing down on the
reserve funds, a reduction in the payment from Bruce
Telecom, loss of education tax, financial pressure from
labour negotiations, and the payments for the addition at
the medical clinic.
Those issues will be considered once council gets to
discussion of the budget, said deRosenroll. The problem of
reducing the base budget has to be dealt with now, he said.
Councillor Ron Hewitt said council has to discuss what level
of service it is prepared to live with, especially regarding
public works, in order to reduce costs. He urged council to
allow the various committees to discuss this first before
council makes any decision.
Mayor Larry Kraemer said that the recommendation by
deRosenroll, to have the staff and committees spend a month
crunching the numbers, and then bring them back to council
for debate, is an appropriate next step. "Then we'll know
where we start with a zero-based budget," he said. "That's
where we always start at budget time."
"That's not starting at zero," said councillor Mike Leggett.
"The cuts have to come from somewhere - services or capital
costs. Perhaps we should meet and discuss how great these
infrastructure grants really are."
"We could start with staff wages and cut some of that," said
councillor Gordon Campbell, referring to deRosenroll, in
particular.
"Was that fair comment in front of the cameras?" asked
Haight. "Personnel matters are to be discussed in closed
session."
Council agreed to have the senior managers and committees
come up with a proposal for their departments and bring that
to council at the Nov. 18 meeting. A special pre-budget
meeting will also be held.
 |
for
world news,
books, sports, movies ...
