WEYBURN – The 2023 budget for the City of Weyburn was approved at Monday night’s council meeting, with a 4.9 per cent tax increase.
The approval came after a period of public consultation was held from Oct. 24 to Nov. 18, along with a citizens meeting about the budget held on Dec. 6 at the library.
A representative of the group who put on the meeting, Sean Abram, spoke to council about what came out of the open house he helped to organize.
After going through what all of the responsibilities are of council and administration in running the city, he relayed some of the comments and concerns that came out of the open house.
He noted a lot of comments were made that they didn’t feel council or administration would listen to them or take their concerns seriously, noting there were a couple of people who were even thinking of leaving the city in frustration.
Commenting on the budget process and final document, Coun. Laura Morrissette noted she’s been part of five budgets in her council career so far, and this one was very different as it included the public consultation process as a part of the process.
“This process was a lot different for me, and it encouraged me to ask a lot of questions,” she said, adding, “I’m a taxpayer as well, I don’t want to see a big increase either.”
“I don’t want to see an increase either,” added Coun. Jeff Richards, who noted he’s talked to a lot of people in the community about the budget.
One of the messages that came through clearly for him was to fix the streets, he said, and on the suggestion by some people to reduce wages, this is something he would never do.
“First off, we can’t do that,” said Coun. Richards, noting there are collective bargaining agreements for wages for many city employees, and they cannot be broken without sending the city to a court battle.
Even aside from that, he added, he does not want to cut anyone’s wages and tell employees they would be getting less. In talking to the business community, he noted the message there was to “find efficiencies” in the budget, and that’s what the city has done in this budget.
“I appreciate the Team Weyburn approach that’s happening,” he added.
“It’s been a long and arduous process,” said Coun. John Corrigan, adding that in a budget, they can’t always get it down to what everyone wants, such as a zero per cent increase, as there are improvements that need to be made to city streets and facilities.
“I appreciated all the feedback,” added Coun. Ryan Janke, pointing out the most valuable input he heard were the comments from people who said “don’t cut this” about programs or services, because it tells him what the priorities are for city residents.
“I feel this is a responsible budget,” commented Coun. Mel Van Betuw, who sat in as the deputy mayor, as Mayor Marcel Roy was not present for the council meeting.
“This is a budget that protects the city during difficult times,” he added, noting he’s been on council for 10 years now, and deeply appreciates the dedication of the city staff, especially throughout this budget process.
In presenting the budget, finance director Laura Missal noted they took the input provided by the public and made changes to the preliminary budget, which had initially set a tax increase of 10.34 per cent.
Some of the changes included increase the reserve transfer, taking out the rapid response truck for the fire department, updating wages at the Credit Union Spark Centre, removing new message boards and reducing SaskPower costs. All of these changes removed $522,802 from the preliminary budget, and reduced the amount needed for taxes to $469,186 or 4.9 per cent.
The base tax will be increased by $55, to bring it from $710 to $765 per residence.
Based on a home with an assessment of $250,000, the average tax bill will see a $24 increase plus the increased base tax for a total tax increase of $79.34, or about $6.61 per month, said Missal.
This does not include the education portion of the taxes, as that will be set by the provincial government in their spring budget, and the city has no control over that amount.
In a comment made on Tuesday morning after the budget was passed, Abram said he was “very disheartened” that council did not go back to the public with the budget after making changes to it, and said the city did not use a process that engaged citizens in a creative or innovative way.
• In other council business, the council made a resolution and declared their eligibility to receive municipal revenue sharing from the province for 2023.
In 2022, Weyburn received a total of $1,994,406. This amount is calculated based on three-quarters of one point of the provincial sales tax collected from two years ago.
To be eligible to receive the funding, the city has to submit their audited financial statement, ensure the education property taxes are in good standing, adopt a council procedures bylaw, an employee code of conduct and file the public disclosure statements from all members of council.
