Councillors Kipp, Bestwick & Mckay - Opposed

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Don't Support 2014 - 2018 Budget

At the April 28, 2014 city council meeting three councilors did not vote to adopt the five year financial plan with it's 16.4% tax increase and it's 17.6% fees increase.

Councillor Bill Bestwick:

 "in the face of recovery mode, which most nanaimo-ites still feel themselves in coming out of the collapse of 07-08, we needed to make adjustments and corrections, which I do not believe went deep enough.  We need, as a city to ensure our budget is sustainable year over year and we are in a time where essentials need to be the priority and not the non essentials.  

Taxpayer fatigue is a common theme and concern and i for one believe we are facing a burn out in spending that is not sustainable".

Councillor Jim Kipp:

"The budget did not meet my expectations for a number of reasons.

Firstly, the tax percentage growth is out stripping all living cost indexes and has for many years.   Add the increases for water, sewer and user fees along with negligible increase to service levels and increasing wage/benefit you arrive at tax/cost fatigue.

Secondly, during the budget meetings, after lengthy discussion, recommendation motions for reduction or redirection of spending was either defeated or failed at the table.  The "new" zero base budget review process undertaken gave little opportunity to make changes to staffing levels, functional spans of control, department or project impact.  Add the timing of the "list of 400" and notice of surplus and the timing indicated the financial plan was in place.

Finally, searching for core taxpayer benefits, this financial plan did not identify the foundation, mandatory or discretionary services that Nanaimo provides.  Further, limited funds are allocated for service reviews or service audits, limiting the ability to undertake reviews.  Then the 1% included in the budget to asset management deficits, identified as early as 2010, is not enough to maintain what the city has let alone add...

3 strikes your out"

Councillor Bill McKay:

"As you have pointed out, we had a surplus last year of nearly $4M. What the plan suggests is that we intend to put that into reserve accounts, not use it to offset costs in this year’s budget, AND we want to increase the amount collected from you by 2.5% MORE! 

 

While Mr. Clemens talks about things like how we are far behind the addition of new RCMP officers based on the 2008 plan, it begs the question, “If we are so far behind, and need all these new officers, how come in the last six years, the number of files per year has gone down from 50,000 to 37,000?” It seems to me that we don’t need any more, yet we keep pushing. 

 

I am not in favour of continuing on with two independent swimming pools and the $3-5M in capital on Beban over the next 3-5 years. The per capita cost of the Port Theatre, that everyone loves to bash, is about $5/year, whereas the pools cost us between $45 and $55 per capita. When I discuss these numbers with other communities, they just shudder! 

 

We have to get a handle on this!"