South Frontenac Council - Mar. 29

Wilma Kenny | Mar 31, 2011

Budget down to 4,98%, but at what cost?

On March 22, following Council’s direc-tion to cut back on Public Works spending, Public Works Manager Mark Segsworth presented a revised budget which reduced road and bridge construction by $1.3 M, and trimmed a further $250,000 from overhead. This brought the draft budget down from its original 26% increase to 11%, still some distance from the 4.98% recommended by Council.

This week, CAO Orr listed a number of further reductions, a few gained by drawing from reserves ($45,000 for an emergency generator, and $25,000 for dump monitoring) and several as a result of not contributing to reserves. This last included reserves origi-nally allotted for the Verona Medical centre roof, legal services, temporary employees, fire truck reserve and planning. There were also some ‘found’ savings: the new library will require only half a year’s operating expenses, but had been budgeted for a full year, and last year’s police budget had a surplus be-cause the detachment had not been staffed as fully as expected, and the 2011 septic re-inspection program has been cancelled. Another $100,000 was pulled from the road construction budget. $50,000 was added, however, for the new position of facilities supervisor, which, if approved, would be-gin in June. These revisions, along with an assumed 58% of the gas tax money (this is yet to be approved by County Council), would bring the budget down to an increase of $580,557 over last year, or 4.98%.

Responding to questions about a need for the proposed public works facilities supervisor position, Segsworth said that man-agement and maintenance of recreation facilities, garages, halls and other Township buildings has been sporadic and inconsis-tent. As part of developing a fully integrated waste disposal system, the various waste disposal sites need closer supervision and monitoring. Sydenham Water system plant and distribution is now a responsibil-ity of public works. Vandewal said he was opposed to adding another position, asking whether there would be staff efficiencies achieved through the amalgamation of staff at the township hall. McDougall said he had the strong impression that township was un-derstaffed.  Segsworth was asked for a job description for the proposed facilities super-visor position: this will be presented for dis-cussion at next week’s Council meeting.

Fire Chief Chesborough reported that by cutting his department’s budget to the bare bones, he had managed to bring it down from last year, but warned that if more strin-gent prevention and inspection programs were legislated, he had no funds to meet the requirements. He also issued a strong warn-ing that the township’s nine fire halls were rapidly deteriorating, and there were no reserves for major repairs or replacements. Last year, his department responded to a record 500 calls.

Several councillors expressed uneasiness about a budget that would draw so heavily on reserves, with the result that Mayor Davison suggested that it might be worth considering an increase of just under 6%.

Budget discussion will continue at next week’s meeting, which already has a rela-tively full agenda: Orr noted that it may be-come necessary to set another time aside in order to complete the budget.