Barrie councillors have left city residents guessing what their property tax increase will be in 2023.
While approving the capital budget Thursday night, an important portion of the operating budget remains unapproved and unresolved, as does the tax hike.
That’s because approving the budgets of the city’s service partners — city police, County of Simcoe, Barrie Public Library, and the conservation authorities — has been delayed until March 8. Service partner costs at present represent a 2.07 per cent increase to property taxes.
All that has been approved is a net one per cent increase to the dedicated infrastructure renewal fund (DIRF), which helps pay for the replacement and renewal of Barrie’s roads, pipes, buildings, and bridges.
The cost of maintaining city services was reduced during budget talks Wednesday night from a 0.88 per cent property tax increase to zero.
“We have some serious issues ahead of us and they’re not going to be solved in a night and they’re not going to be solved in a year, quite frankly,” said Mayor Alex Nuttall. “They’re going to be solved over a sustained period of time with a plan that everyone buys into.
“I don’t know what everybody else campaigned on (in last October’s city election) around this table, but my commitment was to hold (the cost of) city operations and to invest in infrastructure. That’s what I committed to,” he added. “I think that over time that’ll be completed. It’s not completed through this budget tonight. And I wouldn’t dare say that to be the case.”
Councillors did get a few things done Thursday night.
They approved a motion that staff in the finance department develop a separate reserve for the DIRF and that contributions to it be increased to two per cent for each of 2023, 2024 and 2025, and that 50 per cent of the DIRF collected be used for stormwater capital infrastructure.
“Barrie owns nearly $6 billion worth of infrastructure and I think what we’ve heard over and over again from residents,” said Coun. Bryn Hamilton, “is that we need to take care of what already exists — so our roads, those potholes we all hear about, our sidewalks, the parks and maintaining our facilities.”
Craig Millar, the city’s chief financial officer, said one per cent DIRF equals $3 million, two per cent is another $6 million a year, $18 million in three years, half for stormwater infrastructure.
To offset the DIRF increase this year, $1.9 million would be taken from the city’s reinvestment reserve and $1.1 million from the tax rate stabilization reserve be used once, to fund city tax-funded operations.
Councillors also referred all capital projects in relation to the downtown permanent market to the finance and responsible governance committee.
Coun. Gary Harvey said there were no bidders on the last request for quotes (RFQ) on the market.
“We need to talk about next steps, especially since the curve ball kind of got thrown in that nobody has submitted for the initial RFQ to move this project forward,” he said.
The previous council endorsed, in principle, the concept of a Barrie Bayside Market Area centred around the conversion of the existing transit terminal on Maple Avenue to a year-round market, including a community commercial kitchen, and the construction of a new building of at least 10,000 square feet nearby to house the Barrie Farmers’ Market, with a goal of opening to the public in 2024.
The estimated total cost is $29 million to $32 million during 13 to 15 years for the permanent market, Barrie Farmers’ Market and three or four additional buildings in the area, plus facilities such as a skating trail and artisans village.
And councillors approved a motion Thursday night that staff issue a request for proposal (RFP) for a company for the purpose of carbon credit generation and monetization. The successful bidder would work with the city to generate, develop and sell carbon credits with a focus on maximizing revenue.
Staff would report back to the finance and responsible governance committee by memo in June 2023 on the outcome of the RFP process.
“We’re actually doing the work and, no pun intended, but it’s literally just going up in smoke,” said Deputy Mayor Robert Thomson. “So I think this is an opportunity and there’s companies out there that can monetize it, measure it and then they sell it to the open market.”
Councillors also created a new capital project for traffic calming measures — speed bumps, radar board, etc. — with one-time funding of $75,000, or $7,500 per city ward, to be funded from the tax capital reserve.
Following Wednesday night’s discussion on this year’s city operating budget, the property tax increase stood at approximately 3.07 per cent — having been reduced from 3.95 per cent by cutting the cost of maintaining city services from a 0.88 per cent property tax increase to zero.
Heading into those talks the 2023 tax-supported base operating budget had total gross expenditures of $408.1 million and a net property tax levy requirement of $283.1 million for city services and Barrie’s service partners.
The 3.07 per cent tax increase, or $142 more, would be on a typical Barrie home assessed at $365,040, with taxes last year of $4,612 and now $4,754.
The tax rate increase for Barrie’s service partners — city police, Barrie Public Library and County of Simcoe — remains at 2.07 per cent.
This year’s capital budget totals $360 million, although $271 million of that figure is requested spending.
There is $89 million in approved capital spending and it includes road resurfacing and flood mitigation, along with the study and design of the upgrades and capacity of the wastewater treatment facility.
There’s $21.3 million to relocate the existing administrative, laboratory and garage functions at the wastewater treatment facility, $21 million to redevelop the existing Operations Centre and $5.6 million for the new Barrie Fire and Emergency Service Station No. 6. It is planned for the southwest corner of Prince William Way and Mapleview Drive, and is to be operational in the spring of 2024. Construction would start mid-2023, and it will take eight to 10 months to build.
This year’s operating budget also includes pre-approval for 20 new Barrie firefighters so the recruitment process for these positions can begin in late 2023, in preparation for the 2024 opening of Fire Station No. 6. There’s no budget impact this year, but the pre-approval would result in pressure on the 2024 tax levy of about 0.68 per cent or $2.1 million.
Barrie’s service partners account for a 2.07 per cent increase in this year’s tax increase.
Police spending is historically the largest segment of Barrie’s annual operating budget, and this year it’s 22.1 per cent. It was 21.8 per cent last year, 22.2 per cent in 2021.
The Barre Police Service 2023 budget asks for 7.28 per cent more, or a $4.29-million increase in city funding. It’s pegged at $63.24 million, an increase from $58.95 million last year.
Police are asking for four more civilian employees this year and five new sworn officers, bringing those totals to 125 and 250 respectively. Barrie police has been at 245 officers since 2020. The five new officers will be on front-line duty, while the four new civilian employees comprise two in human resources, one in information technology and another in records.
Salaries, benefits and overtime make up $56.54 million of this year’s police budget. Of that total, 75 per cent is salaries, 24 per cent is benefits and one per cent is for overtime. That’s a 3.5 per cent increase in salaries and 1.7 per cent more for benefits.
Barrie Public Library, including the new Holly Community Branch, has a 2023 budget which asks for a 2.43 per cent increase in the city’s grant, to about $9.6 million from $9.37 million last year, or $228,000 more.
The County of Simcoe is requesting another $1.7 million, or 6.57 per cent more, for Barrie’s share of its 2023 operating and capital costs. The total net amount of tax supported city funding is increasing to $27.4 million from 25.7 million last year.
The county supplies land ambulances and paramedics, health and emergency services, Ontario Works, children’s services, social housing, long-term care (LTC), seniors services and community services, which includes homelessness, to the city.
