Summerside out more than $100K after Dorian

The City of Summerside is seeing the bills from post-tropical storm Dorian pile up, and it is applying for funding from the P.E.I. government.

At Monday night's council meeting, the finance chair, Norma McColeman reported that the cost of Dorian clean up has reached $121,000, and those costs will continue to rise. 

That's one of the contributing factors to the city showing a shortfall of $1,048,472. That shortfall is not unexpected. Due to discrepancies between when expenses are incurred and when revenues come in, the city had forecast a deficit of $1,496,732 at this point of the year.

McColeman said she is concerned about any further budget surprises.

"Some things are unfunded or unbudgeted or unexpected. It's those kinds of things that come up, the same ways in the household," she said 

"We're in that process where it's going to take quite a while for that recovery process because there were so many trees. There's so many trees and limbs that have been weakened and now the cleanup of the debris, it's just one ongoing process after the other, but it still has to be seen to."

More than trees

Along with trees and debris the storm also caused damage to some of the city's infrastructure, such as power lines and the sign at Credit Union Place. 

McColeman said they are hoping to get some funding from the province, but first the city has to add up all the expenses, and the cleanup continues with no clear end in site. 

"Every time you do think that it's going to be finished, then maybe something breaks down or maybe there there's something that the crew has to go to another area," she said

"It's all of those unexpected, unplanned things that happened that cause the delays."

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