Councillors raise youth exodus and staff overtime concerns in budget talks

On May 21 MV adopted its 2019 budget approving a levy requirement for the municipality of $3,891,271.98. Although Council had voted in favour of a 2.5 percent municipal tax increase to achieve this, Acting Treasurer Amanda Hudder explained the impact of the final figures to Council. Based on $100,000 residential assessment the total property tax decreases by $5.15 or 0.49 percent compared to the amount paid in 2018. Hudder illustrated the impact broken down by municipal, county and residential education taxes per $100,000 assessment.

  • Local municipal tax dollar impact $514.25 $2.16 more than in 2018
  • County of Renfrew residential taxes $363.88 $1.68 more than in 2018
  • Residential educational taxes $161.00 $9.00 less than in 2018

Willmer concerned about youth exodus

Councillor Mark Willmer said, “We are going to get a reduction this year but it’s because of the school board and the school budget. To me, that may seem good to many people but what it means is we’re losing students, we’re not having the same level of education here in the Township. That’s something when we’re looking at long term we have to try to find a way to reverse. We need to bring new people into this community. We need to bring young families – fast — because we’re going down quickly. When you look at our schools and their enrolment, you just see what’s happening. When we look at a budget like this, we all say, ‘That’s great – we’re paying a little bit less.’ But when we look at the long term, the school board portion is important [so] that we don’t forget why that is happening. It’s because we’re losing the youth and young people in the community.”

Referring to the recent opening of a daycare centre, Mayor Kim Love agreed, “It’s very important to our economic development that we have those sorts of services available to young families so that they are able to stay in our community and work.”

Hudder said the budget was building up reserves to assist with future infrastructure needs. Council joined Mayor Love in congratulating staff on the budget.

Peplinski concerned about staff overtime

peplinskiAchieving consensus on the 2.5 percent increase to the municipal portion of the budget, however, did not arrive without some difference of opinion. At the Special Council meeting on May 15, Hudder said the impact of Council’s recent budget directions to staff would actually require a 2.87 percent increase and offered them a choice of five different options to achieve the necessary levy requirement. Before Council voted for the 2.5 percent increase, Councillor Peplinski, “I’d like to see a breakdown of the overtime that’s been allocated for each department.”

Councillors Willmer and Bromwich disagreed.

Willmer said, “I think it’s important for a business to check every line and go through the costs associated with it. But I also think that staff have done a good job of doing that…. The reality is that inflation is 2 percent plus…. We’ve got our budget down to 2.87 percent and we have a couple of options to bring it down.”

Bromwich said, “All municipal governments … depend on staff to inform them of what they need in a budget because staff are the experts on what they require for their particular department. So I go with the staff recommendations. The 2.5 percent was basically, I think, the GDP of Ontario for 2018-19. If we just keep at that level we’re not going to get caught behind like we did a few years ago where we kept taxes at no increase over three years and then had to increase them by 30 percent to catch up.”

Mayor Love asked CAO/Clerk Suzanne Klatt to speak to the issue saying, “Councillor Peplinski is concerned about overtime.”

Klatt said Hudder had presented her with an overtime report broken down by department as previously requested. She said, “Council needs to recognize that every re-allocation of staff, every suggestion that we’ve made as it pertains to gaining efficiencies and re-structuring, Council has been part of that process all along and has helped us to get to where we are.”

Hudder said, “I would just like to add that in discussion with all the staff members here within our office, we don’t want to work overtime…. We love our jobs, we come in and we do our work, and then we want to go home at the end of the day.”

Council voted unanimously for the 2.5 percent increase.

Photos: Shown at top Councillors Bromwich and Willmer, Mayor Love, CAO Klatt; Inset Councillor Peplinski

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