City needs the $52 million to rebuild from flood

It’s hard to believe it was five weeks ago today that the rivers crested. In some ways, it feels like yesterday, but we’ve been through so much and it happened so quickly that it almost seems we’ve forgotten the scope of the devastation.

In the last month, I’ve seen things I never thought I would see: the Bow and Elbow Rivers, part of the bloodstream of every Calgarian, running higher and faster and angrier than ever, entire communities under water, and neighbours who lost nearly everything they owned.

But I’ve also seen things that filled me with gratitude: Public servants, from first responders to garbage truck drivers, working so hard to help the afflicted. I’ve never been more proud of my 20,000 City of Calgary colleagues, and those who work for the provincial and federal governments.

The enduring image for me of the floods — repeated so many thousands of times: the picture of that Calgarian, covered in mud, mosquito bites, cuts, scratches and bruises, working to save the home of someone she doesn’t even know.

It’s extraordinary. But now we need to think about how to recover, rebuild, and prevent future damage.

A very early estimate is that City public infrastructure lost $250 million in washed-out pathways, damaged public buildings, and broken bridges, among many others. The Zoo alone may have incurred damage of more than $60 million.

While insurance will cover some of the damage, the rest will have to be borne by taxpayers.

The provincial and federal governments have made significant commitments to help but there will be expenses that they can’t or won’t cover.

An article in Wednesday’s Herald confirms this: in post-disaster Slave Lake and Medicine Hat, extraordinary expenses ate up huge chunks of budgets and both cities strongly recommend that Calgary set aside some money to cover these.

The province has been clear on this. A spokesperson for Alberta Municipal Affairs suggests money will only be available to restore things to exactly how they were before, not, for example, to harden the assets against future natural disaster by using more durable materials.

Indeed, I had a conversation with one of the “flood Ministers” this week, who confirmed that it would be prudent to set aside some money for this purpose.

Furthermore, provincial and federal money doesn’t appear from thin air: it comes from taxpayers. In fact, since both other governments are currently running deficits (unlike the City), any money spent on this comes from borrowing, which has to be paid back with interest from — you guessed it — taxes.

Some people have asked, “Doesn’t the City have cash in reserve? Yes, we do, and some of it — about 11 per cent of our annual budget — can be used for emer- gency repairs. In fact, it has been used for that purpose in the interim (fixing the LRT alone was likely upwards of $10 million).

But we can’t deplete all cash reserves without a plan for refilling them. We insist that community associations we fund, for example, have 10 per cent cash, and our policy is to have up to 15 per cent ourselves. If we use up our “rainy day fund” for flood repairs, it will have to be replenished. At this point the only source is taxes.

Of course, we need to run The City as efficiently as possible, and we’ve made good headway by trimming the city budget by more than $100 million during the last three-year budget and starting zero-based budgeting. But the savings we will continue to find won’t cover the costs we’re expecting to bear for this recovery.

So, do we use the famous $52 million on hand now or raise taxes in future? I prefer the transparency of setting aside the money we have now for this specific purpose, rather than having to increase taxes later to replenish reserves. Our property taxes are the lowest of any major Canadian city, and will stay so regardless of this decision.

My favourite — and funniest — line this week from someone arguing that Calgarians shouldn’t have to fix the public infrastructure was, “the citizens of Calgary did not create the flood devastation.” True. But, Mother Nature the Bow nor Elbow rivers is willing to pay to fix it. That’s our job as citizens.