With council set to deliberate on the 2014 budget today, it appears a property tax increase is very likely for Estevan property owners.
Unlike in past years where council has worked on the budget over a number of nights, they have set aside all of Wednesday for what is likely to be one of the more challenging sessions in years. If they do not complete the budget today they will return Thursday evening for any remaining business.
In an interview Friday, Mayor Roy Ludwig said that a mill rate hike is highly likely but did not commit to how big of an increase there might be.
"In the past, we have made mistakes by thinking we were doing the right thing by going for years without mill rate increases," Ludwig said. "I think what you are going to see going forward are incremental increases every year rather than going for years without increases and then bang, a great big one.
"As long as people see that we are moving forward and doing things (with the money), increases every year are not maybe a bad thing."
Word of a potential increase will not come as a big surprise to the general public.
As has been well documented, the City is running with an overall debt between $32 and $35 million. As well, the City recently applied to the provincial government to have their debt ceiling increased to $55 million. That move was deemed necessary to help the City get its financial house in order and begin reducing the debt.
With the debt a very large elephant in the room, Ludwig said council will have some tough decisions to make today.
"This will be kind of a turning year for us," he said. "Our debt is high, we are going to take our ceiling up in short term but we are absolutely determined to wrestling the debt down and year by year getting it to a much more manageable level.
"But we still have a city to run and we still have major projects that we have to do. It will be a juggling act; what projects do we move forward with and where we can cut back a little bit and still do what we have to do to have the city progress and move forward?"
The man tasked with putting this year's budget together is City treasurer and acting city manager Jeff Ward, who joined the City earlier this year.
Ward said the budget process was a challenging one, but he is confident the City is moving forward in the right direction.
"I think this council is pretty united in what they want to do financially," Ward said, "and I am pretty confident in the numbers I am presenting them and the account structure we've got here. The new account structure will make reporting accounts so much easier so we can consistently review the budget accurately, that was a main focus for next year."
The City of Estevan, and other municipalities in Saskatchewan, will also have to account for a three per cent reduction in municipal operating grants from the province.
Ward noted that decrease will result in the City getting $75,000 less than last year.
