Saskatoon council fails to make inroads on city budget shortfall

Saskatoon city councillors got off to a slow start trying to deal with the massive shortfall in next year's budget.

The city is facing a $52-million funding gap in 2024, due to inflation and spending growth plans. If spending isn't reduced, that would require an 18 per cent increase to property taxes next year.

The governance and priorities committee, made up of the mayor and all council members, held its first "special budget meeting" Thursday. But after spending an hour and a half just discussing the process they would use, they spent the next couple hours debating a motion that would ultimately fail.

It was a motion from Coun. Darren Hill asking the administration to come back with a preliminary budget with a maximum four per cent increase.

That was a change in direction from council's plan to take a more active role in deciding where cuts are going to have to be made, early in the budget process. The motion failed on a 6-5 vote.

"In the interests of transparency and accountability, I think we need to stay the course," Coun. Cynthia Block said. "I really don't see a way to fully flesh out the depth and gravity of what we face without doing it together, both by the politicians and the administration."

All the councillors were in agreement that a property tax increase in the range of 18 per cent is out of the question, but they learned that bringing it down to four per cent would involve some deep cuts to city services.

"When you look at our major areas where the city spends money — police, transportation, fire, transit — we'd have to dig deep into those areas, to get it to four per cent," chief financial officer Clae Hack told council. "And we didn't want to make the presumption that council was interested in digging deep into those areas, so we did the best we could to manage the inflationary pressures, maintain services."

A common theme among those in favour of Hill's motion was that it doesn't seem reasonable for council, in a handful of committee meetings over the summer, to go line-by-line and make the cuts needed.

"I think the bell that went off for me more than anything else was when I heard that if we want this (new report from the administration), it's going to take until September," Coun. David Kirton said. "But yet we're expected to do this in three-hour, four-hour meetings. That doesn't equate to me."

Kirton, Hill and councillors Troy Davies, Randy Donaeur and Bev Dubois voted in favour of the motion, while those opposed were Block, councillors Hilary Gough, Mairin Loewen, Sarina Gersher, Zach Jeffries and Mayor Charlie Clark.

The main report that council was planning to discuss will now be put off until the next special budget meeting. It contained one big-item recommendation: only funding the impact of inflation by 25 per cent and reducing the planned 2024 contributions to major projects. While this would save $20 million, it would "put additional pressure on future years' budgets."

Administration also recommended some changes to fees and staffing, which would result in more minor savings, such as:

• Increase pet licences by 10 per cent.
• Increase cemetery rates by three per cent.
• Defer the creation of two new positions for the fire department (a fire services asset manager and a communications consultant).
• Reduce the contribution to Remai Modern's maintenance budget.
• Increase fees for tax searches by $5 to $10.
• Increase rates for tax penalties by 0.25 per cent.
• Increase parking ticket penalties (up to $70 from $50 for late payment and up to $40 from $30 for parking after the purchased time has expired).

While council didn't get into debating other potential cuts, some of their questions to administration revealed where they will be looking. Hill spoke about a hiring freeze and across-the-board staff reductions, while Dubois asked about cancelling capital projects.

The police budget was also a topic of interest for some councillors, given the big chunk of the city budget that it takes up.

Council's next special budget meeting is set for July 25.