Wellington North staff will be chopping a bit more after a preliminary budget with an 8.9 per cent hike was presented at a special budget meeting on March 10. Council indicated a budget with a 3% hike is acceptable, leaving department heads to do the trimming.
“The clear direction from council is that they would like staff to work towards trimming the budget from the 8.9% presented to a 3% levy increase,” CAO Mike Givens said after the preliminary budget was presented. “The challenge the township faces is that our capital needs outweigh the available levy dollars and, outside of the federal gas tax, the township was not successful in getting any infrastructure dollars from the provincial or federal governments.”
The capital budget presented to council Monday afternoon included projects in excess of $4.3 million, with $345,000 being funded from the gas tax.
“In comparison the 2013 capital budget was for $3.6 million but reflected $1 million in provincial and federal funding,” said Givens.
Councillors are looking at ways to pull some of the capital projects out of this year’s budget and put them off until next year or fund some projects partially this year and complete the funding next year.
What could come on the chopping block or get partial funding this year is the Miller, John, and North Water streets project set at $1 million that would provide services to the Murphy land slated for development at the south end of Mount Forest. A project not expected to go on the chopping block is township portion of a county project to redo Frederick Street in Arthur, including new sanitary and water and repaving. The township portion of the work is set at about $1.7 million.
The Concession 6 bridge requires $345,000 worth of work to strengthen the structure on the heavily-travelled road that sees about 1,000 vehicles daily.
On the recreation side are three projects that have been on the books for a few year, including a generator for the Mount Forest Sports complex at $95,000. However the cost could be trimmed depending on how much of the complex would need to be serviced by a generator. Another project would be replacement of header pipes for the Arthur community centre pegged at $90,000. Council was told if the 40-year-old pipes that service the facility were to go down it would take about a month to replace and would make the ice service inoperable. The third project would be to replace accessible doors at the Arthur community centre estimated at $28,000. The work could also be put off one year.
Finance chairman Andy Lennox said the township is facing considerably more capital projects than it can finance at this point.
“I recognize there are significantly more projects that need our attention than we have resources for,” Lennox said. The councillor also raised concern about approximately $800,000 coming out of reserves to cover the capital projects.
“That big of a withdrawal from reserves, I have a concern with,” he said.
Councillors Dan Yake and Sherry Burke expressed concern about projects that have been on the books for a long time and are being put off again. They want projects put off to be earmarked and in place in the 2015 budget.
“From a recreation perspective the three priorities we have set out here have been on the table long enough,” Burke said.
A 3% hike on an average property assessed in 2014 at $217,297 would see taxes go up from $1,154 to $1,161, six per cent would see an increase to $1,195 and 8.9% at $1,227.Givens told council that township efforts have reduced debt from $12 million in 2009 to $8.5 million last year.
“We’ve knocked off a healthy amount in our debt,” he said. “The onus will be on staff to evaluate the priorities to meet that levy,” he added, referring to the 3% targeted by council.
