Even after revising their 2017 budget, North Battleford City officials were still fuming Monday over the loss of payments in lieu from SaskPower and SaskEnergy.
City representatives said they would be heading to Regina on Tuesday for meetings with colleagues from other cities that have been affected.
The point of the meeting, according to Mayor Ryan Bater, is to “clear the water and to try and find some answers.”
At Monday night’s meeting, discussion centred on two pieces of correspondence the City had received. One was a letter from the Battlefords Chamber of Commerce who gave their response to the City’s budget revisions.
The other was correspondence from government relations minister Donna Harpauer on the cuts to payments-in-lieu.
According to correspondence from the minister: beginning April 1, 2017, SaskPower will not be making a “payment in lieu of taxes” to 13 cities. The amount of this payment is not separately disclosed on a customer’s SaskPower bill as it is embedded in SaskPower’s rates;
Beginning April 1, SaskEnergy will not be making a “municipal payment” to 15 cities and 94 towns. In the case of SaskEnergy, this charge for a payment in lieu is separately disclosed on a customer’s bill as a “municipal payment”;
Finally, SaskPower collects a municipal surcharge on its customers’ bills which is separately disclosed on the bill under “surcharges and taxes.” According to the minister, this payment is not affected by any 2017-18 budget decisions and will continue to be paid.
As for the amounts specific to North Battleford for the previous year 2016-17, the SaskPower payment in lieu of $762,083.79 is being discontinued and the SaskEnergy municipal payment of $391,133 is being discontinued. The SaskPower municipal surcharge payment of $1,602,151.07 will remain for 2017-18.
The City will retain partial payments of the SaskPower and SaskEnergy payments, however, due to the 30 per cent cap on reductions.
The correspondence from the minister was intended to clarify decisions made in the provincial budget and its impact on communities. But City officials appeared more confused than ever in receiving the letter Monday night.
“Unfortunately for me, it creates more questions,” said Mayor Ryan Bater.
Bater said the letter has been forwarded to colleagues at the Saskatchewan Urban Municipalities Association. City officials have also forwarded the letter to MLA Herb Cox, seeking more clarification.
City manager Jim Puffalt said other cities were “in the same boat” as far as trying to figure out what it all meant.
“The bottom line is money has been taken away that shouldn’t,” said Puffalt. He added they hoped to get some answers in their meetings in Regina.
In general, an extensive amount of Monday’s meeting saw councillors speaking at length about the provincial budget, as well as the City’s response to it.
The three per cent “downloading levy” that was part of the budget revisions approved at the last meeting came up for discussion again Monday night.
That increase would cover $400,000 of the roughly $1.4 million shortfall created in the wake of the provincial budget.
At Monday’s meeting Councillor Kelli Hawtin expressed unease with the decision to increase taxes another three per cent, without knowing full details of what the alternative would be if they didn’t raise taxes.
She noted that city manager Jim Puffalt had made the point that extra taxation was needed, otherwise there would be a big impact on service delivery.
“Perhaps we should know what that would look like,” said Hawtin.
She noted other communities had seen options presented of what a zero per cent increase would look like. Saskatoon had extensive public consultations about what services they didn’t want to see cut.
“I’m just wondering if we’re missing that piece. For myself, I am missing that. I can’t quite get onside with this three per cent increase. I know we need it, but I need to know what we’re not cutting.”
Councillor Len Taylor said he understood where Councillor Hawtin is coming from, but added that in his conversations with people, “it’s been the other way round.”
They want more potholes filled, more community safety officers on the street, more police downtown, want their streets cleaned, and so on, he said.
“I’m getting very little feedback at all about all the news reports about having to increase taxes again,” said Taylor.
He also believed any way of trying to find another $400,000 out of services would be a significant cost.
“We could look at every department and what a $400,000 reduction in that department means and that would scare the living daylights out of most people,” said Taylor.
