Bluewater councillors approved a budget for this year at their last council meeting.
Mayor Paul Klopp says budgets are never easy, but this year's was more difficult than most.
“We came in at a 6.81 percent increase, but we also had things on our capital side we feel are going to be good investments that in the long run will save operating costs," Klopp explained.
Klopp says that included things like upgrading the lighting in two of their arenas, getting some HVAC equipment, construction on the main street in Hensall, and they had several culverts that had to be replaced this year.
That means that a home assessed at $246,000 would see an annual tax increase $77 for Bluewater and $75 from the county. Klopp adds they didn't take any money out of reserves but they did reduce the amount they had hoped to put into reserves.
“We were going to put in about $98,000 but as we went through line by line we decided that we would not increase that by $98,000. We increased it, I think, by about $40,000 into reserves," said Klopp
Klopp says it's still important to build their reserves, but in order to keep the increase below seven per cent, they had to reduce the amount they originally wanted to put into reserves.
Since the pandemic and with the current economic climate, Klopp says the municipality has recognized a significant increase in the cost of contracted services, materials, and overall tender and RFP costs for projects. He says some of those costs are offset by user fees, grants, permitting fees and other miscellaneous revenue. But he says additional budgetary challenges have come from the implementation of Bill-23, the More Homes Built Faster Act 2022, which is changing the way development charges are collected.
