Director of Finance Alice Lettner presented the municipality’s revised budget at the March 19 council meeting and stated that there’s an overall net increase of just under $10,000, or 4.72 per cent.
Some of these increases came from within the municipality, like purchasing a new computer for the fire department, but most of the impact stems from the provincial level.
Property owners in Jasper will contribute more this year to the Alberta School Foundation Fund. A total of 32 per cent of Alberta’s public education costs are funded by taxpayers.
The rate a municipality pays is determined by its property assessments.
“Our increase this year is just over a half a million dollars,” said Lettner. “So that’s half a million dollars more that we must put on the tax notices that we send out to our rate payers.”
A fee cap was removed in 2005, so rates can increase in any denomination. Jasper’s increase isn’t nearly as high as other municipalities, like Wood Buffalo, which experienced a jump from $13 million to $39 million.
“The assessment rates did not go up, but we are capturing value,” said Finance Minister Doug Horner.
“The value of your home goes up, the amount you’re going to pay is going to go up even if the percentage may not have.”
He added that these current rates mean that all municipalities are “basically on the same playing field as everybody else.”
Still, the increase is a tough pill to swallow.
“The reality is a significant amount of money is going to leave the community,” said Coun. Mike Day.
Another budget impact driven by the provincial government is the elimination of the $6,000 Summer Temporary Employment Program [STEP] grant in the Community and Family Services (CFS) budget.
The Municipality Sustainability Initiative (MSI) operating fund will be eliminated over the next four years and the MSI capital is also set to decline.
“I don’t anticipate that we are going to see a return to the funding that we had, nor do I anticipate the MSI capital grants being returned to the original agreements that we had with the province,” said Lettner. “We’ve always been basically at 50 per cent of what we were originally promised.”
Some grants for community groups have also been reduced or cut. These include the Community Spirit Program, Community Initiative Program and the Community Enhancement Program.
“I suppose, where grants have been cut ... we should anticipate more groups coming to council looking for funds that they used to get elsewhere,” said Mayor Richard Ireland.
This operating budget still doesn’t address the inevitable solid waste fee hike from Parks Canada; another financial hit to come. “They’re [Parks] looking for potentially an additional $200,000 to $220,000 from us, but they haven’t increased that rate yet,” said Lettner.
Council will vote to adopt the 2013 operating budget at their April 2 meeting.
