South Kent Councillor Ryan Doyle is looking to make some big cuts to Chatham-Kent’s budget.
“Administration has forecasted the tax increase for 2025 to be 9.4%,” Doyle said in his notice of motion, which was presented to Council on September 23, 2024.
“Therefore be it resolved that a 7.5% departmental budgetary annual decrease be realized. The reduction can be achieved with a maximum allowance of a 2.5% reduction in front line services to the public.”
Doyle’s motion is on the agenda for the upcoming Council meeting scheduled to take place on Monday, October 7, 2024.
Gord Quinton, chief financial officer for Chatham-Kent, in 2025 1% of the budget equals $2,051,265.
“Therefore, to achieve a reduction of 7.5% there would need to be $15,384,487 of Municipal Base Budget Reductions,” Quinton stated on the report to Council.
“Council directs the service levels for Administration to deliver to the public. The motion requires service cuts to every service the municipality provides. Some services have service levels directed by Boards. It is Administration’s assumption that the Notice of Motion (NOM) would apply to the Boards as well, which may not be feasible. Some services have service levels directed by the Province.”
Quinton said many services are fully or partially funded by the Province.
“Staff would need direction on cutting these services and sending the matching funding back to the Province,” Quinton said.
“For example, Land Ambulance is approximately 50% Provincially funded and costs approximately $16M to deliver. So cutting the municipal portion by 7.5% or $600,000 would also require giving $600,000 back to the Province and a service cut of $1,200,000, meaning at least 1+ ambulance and 10+ paramedics would need to be removed from the budget.”
Quinton added: “It is unclear in the motion how a 7.5% tax reduction could possibly be made with only a 2.5% reduction in service. Again, using the Land Ambulance example, 99% of the cost is the service delivery. It is an outsourced contract, and Council does not control wages or vehicle costs.”
Chatham-Kent Council has signed long-term contracts for many services delivered at the Service Level Council directed, Quinton added.
“There would be legal implications and financial penalties to break contracts,” he said.
“There are also long-term union contracts previously approved by Council to consider. As explained to Council previously, Chatham-Kent now has Strong Mayor Powers. Council suggestions for the Mayor to consider was the reason for the request of the email from the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) to Council on June 19, 2024 requiring feedback by June 28, 2024. The author of this NOM already provided advice to the Mayor that he was looking for a 5%-10% savings in each department. This NOM is not appropriate at this stage of the 2025 Budget Update process.”
Quinton said Mayor Canniff has met with the Executive Management Team (EMT) and provided budget direction, and the 2025 Budget Update has been finalized and is in the process of being published for delivery on November 13, 2024.
“Perhaps this motion should be brought to the Budget Committee for deliberation on November 26, 2024 instead of being debated by Council in absence of the Budget Update being delivered,” he said.
“The 9.4% noted in the NOM was obtained from the June 19, 2024 email from the CFO to Council indicating where Council decisions to date had taken the 2025 budget from the 8.175% approved by Council in the 2024-2027 Multi-Year. This was prior to EMT Budget Deliberations. Since that time, EMT has made recommendations to bring in a 2025 Budget Update no higher than the 8.175% approved previously by Council. The EMT proposals may have recommendations further reducing the tax increase and will be presented to Council on November 13, 2024 at 6pm.”
Monday’s meeting is being held at the Chatham-Kent Civic Centre starting at 6 p.m.
