Service cuts and an almost seven-per-cent tax hike are up for consideration this month as Morinville councillors continue to work on this year’s town budget.
Town council received a report on potential changes to the 2022 budget Jan. 25.
Council hit the brakes on the budget in December when administration tabled a draft which featured a 15.39-per-cent tax hike (a five-per-cent regular tax hike plus a 10.39-per-cent one-time sidewalk and road repair tax), which would have added about $397 (about 36 dozen Tim Hortons doughnuts) to the average residential tax bill and created a $1.71-million tax-supported deficit.
Council passed an interim budget instead, which is equivalent to 20 per cent of the draft budget. Councillors have held several meetings in January to discuss potential service cuts, and on Jan. 11 implemented a hiring freeze on most new positions advertised on the town’s website until they have passed the 2022 budget.
Three options
Town financial services manager Travis Nosko tabled three options for revisions to the draft budget, each based around a different tax rate.
None of the options included the special road and sidewalk tax. Instead, Nosko proposed to cover the cost of those road and sidewalk repairs using un-allocated Municipal Sustainability Initiative money and regular taxes. All three featured a lengthy list of cuts and additions which would shave a net $261,755 off the budget.
The Morinville Leisure Centre operating hours were to be cut by 20 hours a week to save $120,000, for example. All town-backed “Live at the MCC” events would be cancelled, as would the town’s Snowman, French Heritage, Easter Egg, and Best Gardens events. The town would sell its community bus; plant half as many flowers; eliminate its vacant non-residential improvement grant; cut the cost-of-living raise for non-unionized staff to one per cent from 1.5; and start charging for development reviews and lot grading on a cost-recovery basis. Administration also proposed to cancel plans to replace streetlight banners and buy a new public engagement platform, which would save $42,500, and to save another $197,000 through vacant positions.
Offsetting these cuts would be a $75,000 boost to the snow-clearing budget to account for recent extreme weather; $30,000 for an analysis of new operating models for the town’s leisure and community cultural centres (as ordered by council on Jan. 11); $85,200 to find a replacement for outgoing chief administrative officer Stephane Labonne; and $14,000 for a municipal intern.
Option One, which administration recommended, proposes a 6.92-per-cent tax hike and uses $880,400 in MSI dollars to pay for road repairs. This would leave the town with a roughly $1.5-million tax-supported deficit and add $175.50 (about 16 dozen Tim Hortons doughnuts) to the typical residential tax bill.
Option Two features a 5.5-per-cent tax hike and uses all the town’s unallocated MSI money, causing a $1.6-million deficit and adding $139.48 to a residential tax bill. Option Three proposes a 4.5-per-cent tax hike (about $114.12 more for an average home) at the cost of a $1.73-million deficit.
All three options would raise the town’s residential/non-residential tax split, which currently sits at 1-to-1.1. The first two would raise the split to 1-to-1.2 (i.e. non-residential properties pay 20 per cent more tax than residential), while the third would raise it to 1-to-1.15. (The town hopes to eventually reach a 1-to-1.5 split to bring residential taxes more in line with those of its neighbours.)
Interim problems
Council also heard about cash crunches caused by their decisions related to the interim budget.
Morinville Community Library trustee Linda Ladouceur told council the library is “struggling greatly” to work with the money they have been given under the interim budget. They had asked for $592,000, which included $25,000 Sturgeon County had previously provided and $60,000 they previously returned to the town due to pandemic-related layoffs. The draft budget, upon which the interim budget was based, had just $442,000 set aside for the library, which did not account for the end of those layoffs or the loss of cash from the county.
Ladouceur said the library is in “dire” financial straits and needs about $62,000 to stay open until the end of March. Without it, it will have to cut its operational hours by a third.
Council voted 6-0 (Coun. Jenn Anheliger absent) to give the library $10,000 to keep it open for February, by the end of which time council plans to have the budget passed.
A report to council said the Jan. 11 hiring freeze had caused staff shortages at town facilities, which could force the town to start closing rinks and cancelling programs. The finance department is also short a new hire due to the freeze and is spending more on overtime than it would cost to bring on the new employee.
Council moved to continue its budget discussions on Feb. 8.
