After a final stretch of debate and discussion, Moose Jaw city council officially passed their 2019 operating, capital and equipment reserve budgets during Monday’s regular meeting.
The budget marked the first year for the city’s new priority-based budgeting system, which saw city administration and the various departments put themselves under close scrutiny in order to find the most cost-effective systems and savings possible.
The end result is a 3.01 per cent mill rate increase, which will generate an additional $857,500 for the city’s operating and capital budgets.
That’s down from the 3.82 per cent tax increase that the preliminary ‘status quo’ budget brought forth in early December.
“We’ve had to navigate some very difficult waters and that’s just the reality of where we’re at, that’s not trying to shy away from the job we’re elected to do,” said Moose Jaw Mayor Fraser Tolmie in a passionate defence of the budget just prior to its final passing
“I see within this budget that we’re bringing to the community something that is stable and positive, we need a steady hand and we need to know what we’re capable of… this budget is not perfect, but it is correcting this ship called the City of Moose Jaw and we’re all part of it. We’re trying to help our local businesses. There are lots of positives, this city is a great city and we have lots of opportunities to capitalize on, and I think this is a good budget.”
Coun. Brian Swanson brought forth numerous revotes on capital and operating budget items, ranging from municipal airport financing to council remuneration to the healthy living program for city employees, most of which remained as originally voted on.
His final assessment of the operating budget alone saw much room for improvement.
“This is the third operating budget of this council, there’s one left and I think the template has been set with the ‘status quo plus three per cent, higher taxes and more city hall employees,’” Swanson said. “I feel we’ve failed to address the needs of the community with respect to our budget; we’re disregarding the economic realities of Moose Jaw.”
Swanson pointed to the city’s lack of population growth and vacant commercial properties as a sign of how the situation isn’t a positive one. Add in the 58 per cent increase in tax arrears and how 7.7 per cent of tax levies are uncollected and things don’t improve in that regard, he said.
“We have significant expenditures in core infrastructure needs and rather than raise taxes I feel it’s incumbent on us to redirect existing funding,” Swanson said. “I believe our budget disregards the fiscal pattern our city has seen for years and this isn’t changing what city hall is doing. . . I would suggest we have it backwards, instead of city hall serving the community, we have a community that serves city hall.”
This rankled Tolmie, who pointed to his own work as mayor as an example of how to try and make things better.
“We’re not some big monster sucking the life out of the community,” he said. “You want economic growth and you want to see people in the stores and out shopping? You don’t stand here and say ‘it’s doom and gloom in this community,’ you get active.”
Tolmie pointed to his discussions with Sask Polytech and recent job losses there as one way to turn a potential negative into a positive.
“I’m actively talking to them to find programs so we can attract other students,” Tolmie said. “We have the highest number of foreign students right here in Moose Jaw. We have new programs that are going to be kind to this community. We need to change the attitude of this city and not look at what we don’t have but what we can go after.”
Coun. Heather Eby – who returned to council this fall after a by-election – pointed to her experiences in the past as a councillor and how some of the tough decisions that had to be made at budget time back then had her in a positive frame of mind with regards to council’s decisions for 2019.
“Over the years of being here, I’ve had to support tax increases that weren’t easy to be a part of or support, but they were necessary to get things moving and I’ve never apologized for doing so,” Eby said. “But tonight to vote in favour of a 3.01 per cent budget actually feels pretty good.”
The work that was done to pare down the preliminary budget by nearly a full percentage point wasn’t easy, she said, and even involved herself and Coun. Chris Warren reviewing individual line items in addition to city administration bringing forth a report that proposed an eight per cent reduction and exceptionally severe cuts in many areas.
“We didn’t feel it was good, we were able to at least have a look at those things and we appreciated city administration for putting that together and giving us options,” Eby said. “There were a lot of people who put a lot of effort into making this the best budget possible, and while nobody likes to see a tax increase, I think this is going to make things run more efficiently and I really look forward to next year when we can look back and see the positive things that came out of this.”
Be sure to check MooseJawToday.com and the Moose Jaw Express for more on the budget in the near future.
