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Basic Infrastructure Not Being Financed!
Basic Infrastructure Not Being Financed!
At the FPCOW meeting on Monday Nov. 29, the new city manager Mr. Al Kenning said he did not feel the 'looming' shortfall in infrastructure needed to be dealt with at the present time. Saying he felt the needed tax increases might be easier for taxpayers to swallow (paraphrased) if they are increased at a later date. The logic for the postponement was not really clear other than not wanting to upset taxpayers with a higher tax increase.
With the exception of councilor Pattje no one on council including the Mayor seems the least bit troubled with the fact that even with current tax increases we are not actually budgeting to pay for water and sewer infrastructure in the city of Nanaimo.
What Are We Doing?
When a city is no longer taking care of it's basic infrastructure such as sewer and water how long do you think it will be before we hit the wall or to put it more colorfully until the s_ _t hits the fan! Given the current sewer infrastructure shortfall that could literally be the case!
The above charts, taken from the Asset Management document posted on the city website have been presented to council on two occasions by Mr. Hickey who is the director of Engineering and Public Works. It graphically shows that in years to come the basics of sewer and water will have been underfunded drastically! I have asked city council to put a dollar figure on this shortfall trying to see what our tax increases 'should' be in order to avert this shortfall.
In other words the current budgeted tax increase of over 20% and the budgeted increase in water rates of 25% is NOT ENOUGH to maintain the basics of sewer and water!
In other words the current budgeted tax increase of over 20% and the budgeted increase in water rates of 25% is NOT ENOUGH to maintain the basics of sewer and water!
It is bad enough we have spent our grand kids money without asking, but now it seems we are not even going to be leaving them with anything but a failing infrastructure!
A cynical mind might think that current staff and council would just as soon avoid telling the average taxpayer how much their taxes really should be going up, in the hope they will no longer be responsible when the S_ _T does hit the fan!
Government Is Too Important To Be Left To Politicians
Get Informed Get Involved
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