YORKTON - Yorkton Mayor Aaron Kienle said the recent provincial budget was ultimately a rather bland affair.
“It was kind of a ‘same as’ (budget). There wasn’t a lot of excitement there,” he told Yorkton This Week Thursday.
Kienle said budget documents do tend to be open for interpretation, making it difficult to know exactly what is included only a day out from it being presented. He explained that the Saskatchewan Party suggested increased health and education spending, but the opposition are suggesting both areas saw funding cuts.
In respect to both areas Kienle said he will sitting down with the city’s Director of Finance Ashley Stradeski to delve more deeply into the budget details to better determine what is included.
That said Kienle said he was aware from pre-budget meetings with the province a new regional hospital for Yorkton was not included.
“I knew that wasn’t going to be there,” he said, adding when another step on the long talked about project is to be made by the province remains an unknown.
One positive included in the provincial budget was continued support for revenue sharing with municipalities, offered Kienle.
“We appreciate the continued commitment to that,” he said.
At the same time Kienle said there was a hint municipalities may be facing new costs since there was no new money for the Saskatchewan Assessment Management Agency (SAMA). In a revaluation year “operational costs have risen,” he said, adding those will likely now be born at the municipal level.
The creation of new bylaw courts was also praised by Kienle. The new courts – the closet to Yorkton to be in Fort Qu’Appelle – will mean municipal bylaw cases will be moved out of the often clogged provincial court system to a new court that should speed the process. In Yorkton some 200-250 bylaw cases head to the courts annually.
Kienle said he has also hoped there would be new funding for mental health and addictions programming, but there were no new dollars.
The growing deficit, and the associated interest paid in making debt payments was also on Kienle’s list as worrisome.
“There’s a concern with the growing provincial debt,” he said.
Kienle said the entire budget of course was tabled in a time of financial uncertainty based on the tariffs currently being imposed and threatened on Canadian exports.
“There’s uncertainty around tariffs,” he said, adding he certainly noted the budget did not lay out a plan in regard to the impact tariffs may have.
