St. Albert city council put its official seal of approval on the 2013 budget on Monday night, even if one councillor said he couldn’t support the final product.
All but Coun. Cam MacKay heartily endorsed the fiscal plan for next year, which will feature an operating budget of approximately $120 million, a capital budget of $15.36 million, a utility capital budget of $19.69 million.
Those budgets include a final property tax increase of 3.27 per cent and a utility increase of 6.5 per cent for 2013.
“It was a challenging project to go through,” said Mayor Nolan Crouse. “We had our shot.”
Coun. Roger Lemieux was absent for the vote and MacKay voiced his displeasure with the final document, saying council needed to do better.
“I appreciate the effort and work that was put in. I, however, when I look at the numbers, I cannot reconcile them,” MacKay said.
MacKay conceded that a property tax increase of 3.27 per cent was “not out of the realm of what has occurred before,” but said he couldn’t justify passing a budget with a tax increase greater than inflation.
“You’re left thinking to yourself, ‘I have to go home and sleep anyways,’” MacKay said.
MacKay did vote on Dec. 6 with the rest of his council colleagues to ask administration to prepare the 2013 budget based on the direction provided during deliberations in November and December.
Crouse pointed out everyone had an opportunity to work with the proposed budget.
“We each had a chance to bring forward motions, so anyone who chooses not to vote on any part of this has an individual right,” Crouse said. “We also had an individual right to bring forward recommendations and debate them.”
Only one member of the public turned out to object to the budget. Norm Harley, a former city council candidate, called council’s attempts to cut the property tax increase “insulting and embarrassing.” He called on the city to cut staffing levels at city hall, scale back transit service and eliminate programming for some groups, such as Building Assets and Memories (BAM).
“It’s insulting to hardworking taxpayers that they won’t be getting the same salary increases (as city workers),” Harley said.
