The budget deliberations are in the books in North Battleford.
Council held their fourth and final budget deliberation session Thursday night on the ZOOM platform. At the end of the nearly two hour final session, council passed a motion unanimously to recommend the 2021 budget to council.
That means the budget, with its proposed one percent property tax increase, now heads to council for discussion and potential adoption on Monday, Dec. 14.
In the end, there were no changes to the proposals administration had put forward on taxes. The consensus at the end of the night was to stick with the one percent increase in the general fund, which will flow to capital reserves.
For utilities, the consensus was also to stick with the proposed zero percent increase in the utilities fund. The consensus is also to go with a zero increase to Underground Pipes and Asphalt Replacement for 2021.
For UPAR, council will proceed with the projects for 2021, including the work proposed for 102nd Street. There had been concern expressed during the week about proceeding with work at that location due to impacts to local business.
But councillor Greg Lightfoot noted this particular stretch of road, which runs past the library, a church and government buildings, did not have an abundance of businesses on it.
鈥淚鈥檓 in the camp that we get this done,鈥� said Lightfoot.
Councillor Kelli Hawtin also voiced support, but wanted greater communication done with the businesses affected there, prior to the work happening.
鈥淲e鈥檝e got to minimize distuption as much as possible,鈥� said Mayor David Gillan, who also indicated he was in favor of going ahead.
For third party grants, Transit is going to get the go-ahead to purchase a new Handi-Bus, with savings found in operations to allow that to go ahead. Overall, council was satisfied with the dollar value in the budget of approximately $1.7 million towards conditional grants.
Council also spent a lot of time Thursday working to find consensus on a number of 鈥渦nfunded鈥� items for 2021 to see if they could be moved into the 鈥渇unded鈥� column.
A few of those discussions stood out:
On the potential hire of an additional RCMP police officer for North Battleford, that will require a bylaw change and some other discussions and Mayor Gillan made the suggestion to bring this issue back to council later in 2021.
Regarding the request by Protective Services to add one additional Community Safety Officer in 2021, that item has been moved from 鈥渦nfunded鈥� to 鈥渇unded.鈥�
Administration has been able to find a way to fit the hire into the budget for 2021 so it can proceed. Director of protective services/fire chief Lindsay Holm said they were able to get their initial ask down to $110,000 for that position, and have also found some other savings and ticketing and business license revenue elsewhere to make it work.
Council expressed their support for the CSO program and also expressed their desire to discuss it further in the new year. The CSO program is likely to come up for discussion at planning committee in January.
For planning and development, there was discussion regarding a request for two downtown signs proposed for 2021. It was an unfunded item, but there was little enthusiasm for going ahead with it.
鈥淚 don鈥檛 think this is the year to put up any fancy signs anywhere,鈥� was the reaction from councillor Len Taylor.
Council also discussed the issue of addressing the Sobey鈥檚-Co-op intersection across Territorial Drive. Mayor Gillan told council he has made some contacts with the province and the intention is to research funding options in 2021 and find a solution that would get it into next year鈥檚 budget in 2022. The item remains unfunded for 2021.
Council also took out of the budget two capital items under leisure services totalling $95,000; Centennial Park seniors exercise equipment and the Allen Sapp Gallery basement renovation. Those projects are being deferred and the money will be put instead towards capital reserves.
The budget will be on the council agenda Monday.
