Wasaga mayor pushes for no tax increase

WASAGA BEACH — Municipal staff have taken a scalpel to the town’s budget, slicing off another few points.

On Tuesday, councillors were presented with a second draft of the 2015 budget. The first draft presented to the previous council showed a tax increase of 1.39%; this latest round, prepared by Monica Quinlan, has the increase down to 1.03.

In her presentation to council’s committee of the whole, Quinlan indicated the capital budget had been decreased by more than $316,000, while operating costs had increased by $172,000, mainly due to an increase in policing costs.

Mayor Brian Smith, who made the concept of zero-based budgeting a plank in his successful election campaign, says that whittling the increase to a smaller number would be ideal.

“To come back with a zero budget would be absolutely great, and we’re going to work hard to do it,” Smith said after Tuesday’s committee of the whole meeting. “I’m going to hold everyone accountable and looking and speaking with staff to see if we can do that.”

Smith said while he didn’t promise to hold the line on taxes for this year, he did want to introduce his budgeting concept to town hall.

“You start at zero, with no increase, and we work backwards if we can, and forward if we have to, but at the end of the day we don’t start at anything above or below zero,” he said. “It’s not easy to come up with a zero budget every year.”

Smith said he’d like to break out exactly how residents’ tax dollars are spent.

“We have to start pointing out on our tax bills what these taxes are being used for; for example, policing — I believe we should be separating that out so the average taxpayer understands that ‘x’ amount of [a] tax increase is because of policing and here’s what it is,” he said.

However, added Smith, a one-per-cent increase looks pretty good in comparison to what other municipalities in Simcoe County could be facing. Clearview Township, for example, is starting off it’s budget process looking at a 3.2 per cent increase.

“What I’m hearing around the county, that’s pretty good,” Smith said. “One thing I’ve learned here is we have a great staff, and our treasurer is a very sharp [individual].

“It is really early for us and we haven’t really received any budget presentations up until now. We have to go through that process … I will be looking at the department heads to bring it down even lower if possible.”