City windfall sparks tax-break debate

Councillors split on reducing mill rate or using $1.2M for projects, services

Regina’s city manager launched debate on the 2019 operating budget with a pleasant surprise.

Chris Holden said administration had found $1.2 million in savings that didn’t appear in its $461-million proposal, which called for a 4.7-per-cent mill rate increase.

He said the city had overestimated fuel costs and what it expects to pay for tenders in the year ahead.

“The economy is a little bit slower,” Holden said during Tuesday’s debate.

“We’re getting tenders and proposals coming in slightly under what we budgeted.”

That opened the door for Coun. Sharron Bryce to make an ever-popular move: Try to reduce the mill rate.

She said her residents can’t afford the 4.7-per-cent hike, and proposed using $1 million of Holden’s surprise savings to reduce it to 4.3 per cent.

Her idea earned the support of Mayor Michael Fougere.

“Part of our job is to listen to the community,” said Fougere. “Part of what they’re saying is: Taxes are high. And they are.”

But the proposal threw up a flurry of concerns from their colleagues, who warned that council has a long list of demands to sift through — many of them brought up by residents during Monday’s marathon budget session.

Coun. Bob Hawkins said he was planning to make a motion to build a new Maple Leaf Pool, and suggested holding the proposed reduction until council could “see what’s on the table.”

Coun. Andrew Stevens agreed, before moving his own motion on Maple Leaf Pool.

“I have a stack of motions from my peers,” Stevens said. “All of them look for improvements and expansion of services, and I think that’s a response to resident needs.”

Council agreed to table Bryce’s motion, meaning they would return to it later in the evening.

The room remained nearly empty for the first hour-and-a-half of debate, when the Leader-post went to press. That was a far cry from Monday’s meeting, when the room filled up and about two dozen delegations spent four hours arguing their cases.

Most came to oppose plans to close Maple Leaf Pool in Regina’s Heritage neighbourhood. Councillors heard from a teenager who said the pool “meant everything” to him, a former lifeguard who said it keeps children safe from bullying and abuse, and an anti-poverty advocate who said the city is neglecting “a forgotten area.”

Stevens’s Maple Leaf Pool motion called for a public consultation process. He said the 72-yearold pool is “done” and cannot have any more “band-aid solutions.” But he said a pool has to be part

Unlike city council, when my taxes change I cannot go to my pension plan and ask for an increase in pay. I have to cut.

of discussions on the site’s future.

“The pool has to be on the table,” he said.

That motion was tabled as well. Fougere said there were other motions coming that will directly deal with replacement of the pool.

Councillors will have several other demands to deal with. Monday saw requests from community associations, from daycares and from condo owners, as well as from a mother whose daughter died on a poorly lighted stretch of Ring Road three years ago.

“I’m here with my daughter in my heart asking that no other children and no other family members and no other citizens of our city lose their lives on that corner ever again,” Lisa Boehm told council.

But taxes are likely to remain front of mind. The proposed hike follows an increase of 4.34 per cent in 2018, 6.49 per cent in 2017 and 3.9 per cent in 2016 and 2015.

Retired resident Rob Humphries said his pension hasn’t kept up.

“Unlike city council, when my taxes change I cannot go to my pension plan and ask for an increase in pay,” he said on Monday, referring to a recent council decision to spend $108,000 to make up for a tax exemption loss for councillors that was announced last year and which took effect this year.

“I have to cut.”