Some new councillors still aren’t comfortable with Wellington County’s budget process following a series of reviews of the county’s five-year plan at the committee level.
However, the newcomers are being urged to go through the full budgeting process before requesting changes and Warden George Bridge asked them take some responsibility for getting themselves up to speed on the system.
In January, stating the proposed 2015 budget contained priorities set by previous councillors, first time county councillor Andy Lennox, mayor of Wellington North, suggested deferral of passage until June.
He said that would allow new councillors to get informed and put their own priorities into the five-year plan, which calls for $122.8 million in infrastructure spending from 2015 to 2019.
At the time, Bridge offered to arrange for additional “strategic planning” sessions to go over the spending forecasts in more detail and the budget was passed without opposition. The strategic planning came in the form of five-year plan reviews, which were completed at committee meetings in May.
However, Lennox told council at the May 28 meeting the reviews didn’t satisfy his concerns.
While offering a “thank you to staff and councillors for going through that process,” Lennox said, “It was not my intent when I initiated this that this would be the process. Really what I was hoping for is that, because so many of us are new, that we have a full discussion among all of the council. I get the sense, and maybe I’m wrong, that there’s different interests at play.”
Lennox said it’s difficult to determine priorities of council as a group, “without the full council at the table.”
Erin Mayor Allan Alls said he supports Lennox’s position.
“It’s very difficult being a new councillor to come in and approve a budget you really haven’t been a part of working out,” Alls said.
“I think we really need to have a hard look at where we are spending money … I think we really have to get into the details of where we are going as council.”
Centre Wellington Mayor Kelly Linton also echoed Lennox’s concerns and suggested council needs to have budget discussions collectively, earlier in the process.
“We need to front-end some of the budget discussions that we have,” said Linton.
“I’m new to the process as well,” he added, noting the county’s committee system “is a lot different than the committee-of-the-whole process we have in the township.”
Administration and finance chair Dennis Lever, mayor of Puslinch, said he felt the five-year plan review was exactly the process to which council had agreed.
“My understanding is this is what we agreed to when budget discussions took place. We agreed to talking about the five-year plan. To me, it seems we fulfilled what we actually agreed to back in January,” said Lever, who wondered if the new councillors were actually calling for “a program review.”
“As a new member here I don’t know what the proper term to call it is,” said Lennox. “The way I learn best is with other people and I think this group of people here (council) is a very important group,.
“I believe it is critical to have these discussions setting or endorsing our priorities. I think we all need to be part of those discussions collectively, not as one of eight departments.”
Lennox continued, “I appreciate what’s been done, I just think there’s another further step to be taken, which was my intent and I probably didn’t communicate it very well at the outset.”
“I’m not asking for a program review,” said Linton. “I think there’s another piece of work that needs to go on before you get into that level of detail.”
Linton stated, “We do need to set a process to go into a broad discussion of priorities,” adding he doesn’t believe regular county council meetings are “conducive to having those discussions.”
Ward 9 councillor Pierre Brianceau, elected to office for the first time last October, said council needs to review budget targets earlier in order to bring down the final tax levies. He noted the budget increase seems to come in about one percent less than initial projections.
“I would like to end up closer to inflation, which is two per cent,” said Brianceau. The 2015 budget contained a 2.8% increase.
Guelph-Ermaosa mayor and past warden Chris White pointed out new council members did not experience a normal budget timetable, because the process was well underway prior to the inaugural meeting of the newly-elected county council last December.
“The new folks didn’t get the opportunity to do what we usually do. What you’re asking for is usually done in November,” White explained.
“What does happen, although this year there was a bit of a blip because of the election, is that come November there is a five-year plan review up at Aboyne.”
White said the entire council is involved in that review, after which the budget and plan goes back to committee for discussion.
“After committee discussion, at the end of January, it comes back,” said White. “Rest assured, historically, we’ve always had a couple of meetings with everybody. They do occur.”
Ward 2 councillor Gary Davidson, another new councillor, said council needs to be constantly looking at issues with an eye to budget.
“The finances of this county should be looked at on a continuous basis,” he stated.
Longtime Guelph-Eramosa councillor Doug Breen, who joined county council in 2014 as Ward 8 councillor, recommended going through the entire budget process before suggesting changes.
“The old folks on the wall came up with a pretty good system,” said Breen mentioning the photographs of former wardens that fill one wall in the council chamber.
“They knew what they were doing and I think I’m going to suggest we wait 365 days before making any decisions.”
Breen added, “I’m not sure that I see the holes in the process that other people are seeing.”
Ward 6 councillor Shawn Watters said he was, “not exactly sure what they are proposing as an alternative.” However he recalled on his first term on council it seemed like “there’s a train coming through town and it slows down to about 60 kilometres an hour and you’ve got to jump on.”
Watters wondered if the new councillors were suggesting “abandoning the committee system entirely,” and asked, “is there something that we can do to bring these people up and make them feel more comfortable?”
Councillor Gary Williamson said he was new last term and “found the system was rather overwhelming.
“When I got to my first budget process, and I had dealt with budgets for 30 years (as a municipal road superintendent), I took the opportunity to have a 15 or 20 minute discussion with the treasurer,” said Williamson.
Chris White agreed staff can be very helpful to politicians attempting to understand the process and urged other councillors to “pick up the phone,” and call department heads when they have questions.
“I’m not trying to change the world here. I’m trying to work out the process,” said Lennox. “I’m not totally comfortable with the train analogy … more than half of this council is new. We need to learn from those who have experience … those of us who are new don’t know what’s going on.”
Bridge told council at the beginning of the term “I was very concerned about this – nine new people, some with more experience than others.”
The warden noted staff members were asked to do additional work putting together extra orientation sessions and the five-year plan review for committee meetings.
“We’ve had all the committee meetings. I just ask for a little bit of patience. I understand what Shawn’s saying,” said Bridge.
“Your first budget is pretty scary because – bang – you just got here and you’re into a budget.”
Bridge said concerns raised by new councillors could be discussed at an upcoming meeting of the Warden’s Advisory Committee (made up of council committee chairs).
However, he stated, “I think it’s up to you as individuals to get that learning curve going. You’re being paid to be here and to understand the system. I think it’s up to you to get things going a little bit.
“Maybe at the end of the day the process has to change, but I would like you to take a little bit of time and go through the process … I would hope you guys would do that, take a deep breath and go through this process.”
Lennox told the Advertiser after the meeting he was prepared to try working with the county’s normal budget timetable.
“Ideally I’d like to see it happen earlier, but if this is the process council is comfortable with I’ll be comfortable with it. I just wanted to raise the issue because there’s so many new people,” said Lennox.
