Prince George city council has begun 2024 budget deliberations, which will occur over three days of discussion before wrapping up on Jan. 29.
On Monday, mayor and council sat for eight hours discussing various budget items but no decisions were made.
Administration is recommending a base tax hike of 6.24 per cent, which would include an additional $1 million for snow removal and another $600,000 for road rehabilitation.
During Monday's meeting, council heard from a number of partners and departments including the Prince George Public Library, Tourism Prince George, the RCMP and fire department.
City Manager Walt Babicz began the meeting by explaining some of the challenges the city faces including expanded geographical municipal boundaries in the 1970s to meet the needs of a growing population that was ultimately stagnated.
“And until our city's population grows together with our tax base, we are likely to continue to have challenges maintaining all of our infrastructure.”
He said Prince George’s infrastructure was based on the city having a population of more than 200,000 people by now.
Prince George also has the largest geographical footprint and smallest population in comparison to its peer municipalities.
“And our municipal taxes per representative home are among the lowest in the peer group, despite what's often stated.”
Babicz explained that peer municipalities are also looking large tax hikes. For example, Saanich and Nanaimo are expecting a hike of eight percent while Kamloops is looking at a tax hike of 10.8 per cent.
Council also went through the capital plan and pulled many items for discussion including several “unfunded projects,” which need attention but the city doesn’t have the resources to undertake them. However, administration said they don’t have full cost estimates for those projects and it would take time to get the full scope of what is needed.
Council then decided to revisit those projects at a future finance and audit committee meeting.
Council is also looking at eight enhancements in the budget, which include requests from the RCMP for four additional officers and two municipal employees. The fire department is also asking for additional firefighters, as well as options to build a fire training centre.
If approved, the suite of enhancements would take the tax levy as high as 8.23 per cent.
A 6.24 per cent increase for an average household represents an increase of roughly $160 (a one per cent increase in taxes translates to approximately $25.50 for the representative household.).
The second meeting takes place today beginning at 3:30 p.m. at council chambers in City Hall.
The city must pass a balanced budget by May 15.
