By Emily Keller

budgets

Provincial budget expected to create significant impacts on city

Nov 12, 2019 | 3:00 PM

Impacts on the city caused by the latest provincial budget were discussed at the Corporate Services Committee meeting on Tuesday, November 12.

The provincial budget for 2019 to 2023 would see the amount allocated to Grande Prairie from the province reduced by approximately 17%, or $1.7 million over the next four years. This includes funding from the Municipal Sustainability Initiative, court fine revenues, and for grants in place of taxes.

Mayor Bill Given says the reduction in provincial money is equivalent to more than a 1% impact on property taxes.

“When our council approved the 2019 budget and delivered on a 4.1 per cent reduction, we were already really working to reset our budget with the publics expectation in mind. This is additional pressure on top of pressure that our council had been putting forward, so it will make for a challenging budget discussion over the course of the next three days.”

The province plans to get rid of the MSI in 2021-22, and replace it with a new framework, something Given says may also be challenging.

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“The province has telegraphed their intention, to create a system where municipalities would share in future provincial growth, but at a very reduced rate, and my understanding is that it would take us many, many years to get back to the same level of provincial investment in local infrastructure as we had in 2017.”

He says the provincial budget will also affect parts of the community that have gotten cuts in funding that are not direct municipal services, including some community organizations that are supported or funded both provincially and municipally.

“It could lead to an increased requests for municipal funding to support those community organizations, and ultimately, all of these different groups provide service into our community, and if their revenue is reduced through one channel and not made up through another channel, that means that those community organizations won’t be able to deliver the same level of service that they have in the past.”

City council will begin budget deliberations for the 2020 City budget on Wednesday, November 13.