Chatham-Kent council has approved the 2024 budget with a 5.53 per cent tax increase.
After failing to pass the budget with a 5.76 per cent proposed hike Wednesday night, council managed to trim another 0.23 per cent off the increase, reducing the tax hike to 5.53 per cent.
The average home assessed at $176,200 will need to pay an additional $185 on top of their current tax bill.
"I am confident that the budget we passed still invests responsibly in inflation while meeting the challenge of the current inflation environment," said Budget Committee Chair and Ward 6 Councillor Brock McGregor. "I think we're going to see that our tax increase is low compared to many municipalities across Ontario."
The average annual tax increase across the entirety of the 2024-2027 budget came down from 7.82 per cent to 7.17 per cent, subject to change at each year's deliberation.
South Kent Councillor Ryan Doyle took a big swing, asking council to take $10.4 million out of municipal reserves to cut the 2024 tax increase to zero, and missed.
“I’m just thinking about the people who are hurting at home,” said Doyle. “If we end up taxing people to the point we move more people into homelessness, we’re going to have a bigger issue than we have right now.”
West Kent Councillor Lauren Anderson said if council were to take the tax hike down to zero in 2024, the increase would go up to 14 per cent in 2025.
“I think in the long run and looking into the best interest of our constituents moving forward, this is not the best thing for them at all,” said Anderson.
Doyle’s motion failed 12-3.
All but councillors Bondy, Jubenville, and Doyle voted against it.
Earlier in the evening, Chatham-Kent Mayor Darrin Canniff put forward three motions that won approval and ultimately made up the final changes to the tax hike.
The first motion put forward included covering $25,000 of the budget with additional revenue from Cascades Casino. That passed 14-1.
The second and third motions included adding $50,000 by delaying the hiring of new staff and reducing the asset management funding by half a percentage point to reduce the tax increase. Those passed 15-0 and 11-4.
After about an hour and 35 minutes into the discussion Thursday night, Councillor Anderson called for a vote to pass the budget.
“I think that we skimmed as much as we can,” said Anderson. “I will echo what Councillor Harrigan said (and say) that when we get into budget discussions that are not formulated by an agenda, we can sometimes get to be a little bit scary.”
That motion to adopt the 2024 Chatham-Kent budget passed 10-5.
