REGINA - The proposed 2025 budget for Regina was presented by city administration on Tuesday, which includes hefty tax increases.
As stated in previous city council meetings, Regina is looking at increasing the mill rate by 8.50 per cent, which incorporates civic operations, dedicated mill rates, Regina Police Service (RPS), Economic Development Regina (EDR), Regina Exhibition Association Ltd. (REAL) and council directed rates.
Data from the budget indicates the city and their partners are asking for anywhere around $220,000 to nearly $7 million. In total, over $26 million more of taxpayers' dollars would go towards funding these services.
The city itself is seeking a 1.9 per cent mill rate increase for its civic operations
Some key areas the city will invest in are the revitalization of 11th avenue, the residential road renewal project, park lighting, transit fleet replacement and more.
Reporters asked Niki Anderson, city manager, about the struggle regarding finding balance between councillors not wanting to raise property taxes and Regina needing more investment into infrastructure.
She pointed out Regina had more flexibility years ago regarding keeping their mill rates lowered.
"So, Regina, like many other municipalities, has historically run a surplus," she said. A surplus is when the government collects more money than it spends.
However, Regina's budget started getting tighter, and two years ago, city administration had to find ways to reduce costs in order to balance the budget.
With a prominently new council and mayor, Niki said "our approach this year to [the] new council was saying a lot of this budget are things [you] inherited. [So], my promise to the mayor and council was that as administration we would work as hard as we could to get the mill rate as low as we could [without] lowering service levels."
Daren Anderson, chief financial officer, felt the city did well in containing the costs so the mill rate increase was only 1.9 per cent for civic operations.
He stressed needing to replace aging infrastructure, while adding new facilities as the city grows.
If the city does go forward with the 8.5 per cent mill rate increase, the average homeowner is looking at $17 per month more, which adds up to over $200 extra in 2025.
There is also the proposed utility rate increase of 5.82 per cent, with 4 per cent of these increases funding the utility operating budget.
Part of that fund is investing over $20 million in water supply and distribution, over $21 million in wastewater collection treatment, nearly 93 million in corporate programs and more.
As city administration said before, they were able to keep previous utility mill rate increases lower because of rising interest rates and other factors.
However, Daren noted the city "has a marginal effect that is starting to run out."
He mentioned Regina started paying third parties more to fix water main breaks. As a result, the mill rate increase is "starting to reflect that stress [that we’re facing]," he said.
The other 1.82 per cent of the increase will go towards the dedicated utility increase to fund Intensification Infrastructure and Industrial Development Charge Reduction.
With the proposal, the average household would see a $10 per month increase for their utilities, with a near $120 increase year-over-year.
A reporter asked city administration about the concerns residents have with paying an increase for their water bills.
Kurtis Doney, deputy city manager of city operations, noted that by investing into infrastructure now, the city can reduce water main breaks, which will reduce their operating costs long-term.
With the budget outlined, city council will now look over it extensively for five days starting on March 17th.
