After the first week of budget deliberations, the city council managed to reduce a projected tax increase from 6.94 percent to 5.63 percent by 2025.

Faced with a 5.04 percent impact from external service providers such as the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) and the Simcoe CountyThe city initially forecast a 1.9 percent increase through its own operations, a figure the council lowered to 0.59 percent during operating budget discussions this week.

The combined OPP and county increase, funding over which the city has no control, is “the first time the city has seen budget pressure of this magnitude from outside service partners,” said Melissa Gowanlock, manager of city ​​communications. OrilliaMatters.

Despite pressure from the OPP and the county, Mayor Don McIsaac said it is up to the city to keep the tax rate at a reasonable level.

Since the 2016 budget, the annual tax has not increased by more than 3.86 per cent in any year.

“I mean, people haven’t received those kinds of increases in their salaries. “Many people have fixed incomes,” the mayor said. “When I look at the 5.63 tax increase, that’s Orillia, we can say it’s the OPP and the county, but it’s our responsibility to deal with it.”

The council had to make some creative decisions, such as deferring planned funding for the city’s affordable housing stock this year, or funding a planned community connection center through investment proceeds, and McIsaac said the reduction of Taxation occurs without reducing service levels or compromising council priorities. for the term.

“We established priorities and managed to maintain the priorities that we had established as a council a couple of years ago, and not decrease the level of service. We took a hard line on a couple of things that brought it down a little bit,” McIsaac said. “We are still working on it. “There are still a couple of ideas we are looking at and hopefully we can flesh them out a bit more.”

Some of the actions the council took to reduce the 2025 fiscal impact are as follows:

• Use $665,000 from the tax rate stabilization reserve to soften OPP increases;
• Temporarily reduce the city’s affordable housing fund contribution from $325,000;
• Save $120,000 by changing waste diversion site hours during non-peak days; and
• Savings of $75,000 by transitioning some planted/maintained gardens to pollinator-friendly gardens.

Not all council members were enthusiastic about each of the changes.

The city initially projected a $325,000 contribution to its affordable housing stock in 2025, which currently stands at about $800,000, but temporarily eliminated this year’s contribution to offset its fiscal impact, although there is a possibility of an over-allocation to the stock. at the end of the year.

Count. Janet-Lynne Durnford said she “strongly disagreed” with the move but understood why it was taken.

“We managed to negotiate a possible top-up at the end of the year using… investment funds, but it depends on the success of our investments,” he said. “I was quite opposed to that, but I also understand why my fellow councilors voted for it. “They really wanted to reduce that tax and it is understandable.”

However, she was impressed with how the city managed to fund its planned community connection center, which is intended to serve as a one-stop shop to help address the opioid crisis and connect community members in need to services. social.

As the city’s investments performed well this year, Coun. David Campbell suggested covering the $100,000 bill for the center with investment funds, meaning it would have no impact on this year’s tax revenue.

“Count. David Campbell suggested that the money to support the community connection center be obtained from that source so that there would be no impact on tax collections, and that is what the council adopted. “It was a brilliant suggestion,” Durnford said.

For the community connection center, which has been in the works for more than a year, the city has also applied for a federal grant, which Durnford is “very optimistic” the city will receive.

Budget deliberations continue next week, and the council will discuss capital projects for the new year on Nov. 12-13. Budget ratification is scheduled for December 9.