Your Georgina property taxes could rise $76, water also going up

Yorkregion.com
Nov. 19, 2015
By Heidi Riedner

You may be facing a 4.5-per-cent increase in your property taxes and a 15-per-cent hike in water and sewer rates after the town’s $76-million draft budget was tabled last week.

That would mean an average increase of about $76 on the property tax bill, as well as an average $275 utility bill every three months for those on town services.

CAO Winanne Grant advised if council was looking to trim the budget during deliberations next week, the capital and new initiative proposals should be the first to come under the knife before what she termed an already “tight” and “responsible” $36.7 million operating budget - almost 50 per cent of which goes toward salaries and benefits.

On an annual basis, the town’s treasurer includes within the budget a projection for either a surplus or deficit, which historically has been around $200,000.

“That means at the end of the year, on a $37-million operating budget, we come in $200,000 off the mark ... If we’re coming in $200,000 off the $37 million operating budget, it demonstrates how tight that budget is, and that budget has been getting tighter on a yearly basis,” Grant said.

Some of the big-ticket capital items for the town’s total 2016 budget include $6 million for watermain replacement on Dalton Road in Sutton, $1.6 million for the Lowndes Avenue gravity sewer project, $830,000 toward the roads capital plan, $750,000 for the Woodbine Avenue watermain connection and $556,700 to replace a fire department pumper truck.

New initiatives for 2016 include 11 new staff positions, including four new full-time firefighters, a full-time planner, a fleet supervisor and an operations technologist.

To address projected funding gaps that continue to rise since the “preliminary” $2.5-million estimate for capital outlined in the town’s asset management plan in 2014, town treasurer Rebecca Mathewson said an additional $360,000 of tax levy dollars went into the overall capital program for 2016.

Further reports getting into the “nitty-gritty” on the state of the town’s infrastructure now coming forward estimate a funding shortfall between $3.2 million and $3.6 million just for roads alone, Mathewson added.

The 2016 budget, however, responsibly starts to phase in an increase toward capital to start closing that funding gap, she said.

“We don’t have the answer, we don’t know that number,” she said in reference to the 2016 budget. “We know we are a long way away from achieving a $2.5 million a year funding gap or $3.6M a year funding gap.”

By the time the rest of the studies are completed, it is safe to assume those numbers are going to go up, she added.

“Were not panicked over it,” Mathewson said, adding the infrastructure deficit is consistent across the province and country.

The entire budget is available for viewing on the town’s website and at all three locations of the Georgina Public Library.

Public input is welcome and encouraged before a proposed adoption date of Dec. 16.