Sundre's council began discussing during its regular meeting on Monday, March 13 how to allocate an unexpected surplus of about $190,000.
Sundre's council began discussing during its regular meeting on Monday, March 13 how to allocate an unexpected surplus of about $190,000.
Officials recently learned about the windfall during a fiscal update on the municipality's fourth quarter in 2016.
"We do have a surplus," Mayor Terry Leslie recently told the Round Up.
The mayor said he and his colleagues would be considering potential options, such as whether to increase reserves — and if so, which ones. After all, the more money that's available in reserves, the less the town has to borrow for big projects, leaving more funds available for other initiatives, he said.
"That's the desired way for municipalities to get things done," the mayor said, underlining the importance of having in place well built up reserves to also mitigate burdensome costs on taxpayers in the long run by reducing the amount spent on interest to repay debts.
The discussion might also include whether to allocate some of the surplus to reduce taxation this year, he said.
However, the surplus was in part the result of staff turnover, although some projects throughout the year did come in under budget. But assessments, upon which taxation is based, had been budgeted to grow in 2016 by about one per cent. Instead, assessments actually decreased by roughly one per cent, he said.
So the surplus is essentially a one-time windfall that cannot be depended on to materialize again next year. In other words, a tax break this year might simply end up translating into a much larger tax increase next year to make up for it, which residents might not be in favour of, he said.
"Ratepayers want stable, predictable budgets and finance plans that aren't going to have big fluctuations."
Last night's discussion was largely to start brainstorming ideas, with council wanting to see the spring budget adjustment before committing itself to any particular course of action, the mayor said.
"Council's got some work to do, and some understanding to get so we can make an informed decision about what will best protect ratepayers."
