If all goes well, the 2014 budget for North Battleford will be presented to council by late November.
That was the expectation from Director of Finance David Gillan, who updated councillors on budget preparations at the City's Planning Committee meeting Monday.
In his update, Gillan indicated his department is currently getting all department submissions for the 2015 budget. City Manager Jim Puffalt and the finance department have been approaching each department one-on-one for those.
"We definitely don't have them all done, we're about 40 per cent there," Gillan indicated. But he did anticipate having that completed by the end of the month.
The period Nov. 3 to 21 will see administration review the budget and make revisions as necessary before writing the budget document itself. Gillan indicated the budget document should be complete by Nov. 21.
He also proposed a number of dates for open budget deliberations. Councillors have tentatively indicated Wednesday Nov. 26, Monday, Dec. 1 and Wednesday, Dec. 3 work for them. Also proposed was Dec. 10 date, though at least one indicated that date does not work.
The proposed start time is 5 p.m. for each session. The hope, Gillan said, is for council to be in position to adopt the budget during this calendar year.
The last council meeting of the year, however, is Dec. 8. If budget deliberations do not wrap up by then, a special meeting could be held prior to Christmas.
While it is still not clear what will be in the budget, Puffalt noted the infrastructure deficit over the next 15 years will be addressed in the budget.
It's "certainly the first step in a 15-year plan to get all our streets and undergrounds done," Puffalt said.
