Greater Sudbury wants your opinion on the proposed budget

It's time for Sudburians to weigh in on how their tax money is spent.

The City of Greater Sudbury is holding public input sessions on the proposed budget for 2019. It includes a 3.5 per cent tax increase.

To get public feedback, the city is hosting sessions throughout the city.

The coordinator of budgets, Liisa Lenz, says there are three online tools to share opinions, including a survey and a budget allocator.

"You can go through and decide if you want to maintain the existing spending based on the current approved services or if you think that spending needs to be enhanced, so there's an option to choose a five or 10 per cent enhancement," she explained.

"Or if you think that we need to reduce the spending for that service, again, you can suggest a reduction of five or 10 per cent."

Lenz says the public input sessions are taking place at a variety of places, including libraries, during a Wolves hockey game and the mall.

"We haven't had a lot of attendance at our input meetings in the past, so this year we've tried to do things a little different," she said.

"Instead of having a meeting where people are asked to come to us, we are going to the people."

All the data collected before Feb. 12 will be compiled and presented to city councillors at a meeting on Feb. 19.

The first session was held on Friday at the main branch of the Greater Sudbury Public Library, downtown.

Nicole Theriault, who just retired to Sudbury, took part.

"The roads, for me right now, is a key issue," she said.

"And I have to profess I'm still learning, still learning about what's going on in Sudbury, so part of wanting to learn more is coming to meetings like this."

Here is the list of the upcoming public feedback sessions:

• Parkside Centre, Monday, Feb. 4, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.
• Chelmsford Arena, Monday, Feb. 4, from 6 to 8 p.m.
• New Sudbury Centre, Wednesday, Feb. 6, from 9:30 a.m. to 9 p.m.
• Howard Armstrong Recreation Centre, Thursday, Feb. 7, from 5 to 7 p.m.
• Sudbury Community Arena, Sudbury Wolves Game, Friday, Feb. 8, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m.
• Countryside Arena, Saturday, Feb. 9, from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m.
• T.M Davies Arena (Lively), Saturday, Feb. 9, from 1 to 3 p.m.