Prince George city council started the process to permit administration to carry out the alternative approval process for loans worth more than $11.3 million related to the 2025 budget at its Monday, Feb. 3 meeting.
Several capital projects in the city’s five-year capital plan are scheduled to be funded through the Municipal Finance Authority debt and lease funding, including the purchase of new equipment, renewal work on the stormwater system and the replacement of the Prince George Civic and Conference Centre’s building automation system and chiller.
The equipment financing loan would borrow up to $5,489,500 over a period of no grater than 15 years. That includes:
- $4,178,000 for mobile equipment replacement, buying new vehicles for the city’s fleet,
- $20,000 for new floor scrubbers for the janitorial department,
- $50,000 of new hoses for fire services
- $140,000 to replace six fleet column lifts hoist system units, lifts with a weight capacity of 19,000 pounds used to inspect and maintain the city’s heavy duty trucks and equipment,
- $400,000 for a tractor with a flail mower and
- $701,500 for new arborist equipment.
At the council meeting, manager of legislative services Ethan Anderson said that the borrowing isn’t over long enough term to require review by the provincial inspector of municipalities, but it does require elector approval as it will be over longer than five years.
The stormwater renewal loan would borrow up to $2,620,000 to reline, replace or dispose of stormwater system elements like ponds, outfalls, storm mains, culverts, catch basins, manholes, flood pumps and more.
For the replacement of the Civic Centre building automation system and chiller, which regulates the temperature in the building, the loan would allow the city to borrow up to $3,260,000.
The stormwater and Civic Centre loans are subject to both review by the inspector and elector approval.
If approved, the three loans would result in $1,078,129 in annual debt servicing costs, which a report from city staff says would result in 0.72 per cent worth of future tax levy increases.
Because these are designated as capital projects and the financial impact could last for more than five years, the city is required to obtain the approval of eligible voters.
To get elector approval, the city can either hold a referendum or use what’s called the alternative approval process. Administration recommended the latter option, which council approved like it did with the funding for the Aquatic Centre renovations last year.
Rather than setting up polling stations for residents like would happen with a referendum, the alternative approval process requires electors to submit forms to the city declaring their opposition.
If 10 per cent or more of residents voice their objections this way, the council then cannot grant final adoption of the bylaw unless a referendum is held.
During council’s discussion of the matter, Coun. Cori Ramsay — the chair of the city’s Standing Committee on Finance and Audit — noted that some of the vehicle purchases are “things like fire trucks, things that we really need.”
“Are we going to spend $160,000 to go to a referendum, which is how much it costs to do a vote like that?” Ramsay said. “The alternative approval process, we have seen, has worked and in other communities has actually resulted in failure of approval of these bylaws. I am a fan of trying this process on these sorts of items because I think it’s appropriate.”
Ramsay also noted that the city has some long-term debt coming off the books this year. During budget talks, it was noted that the city was going to retire $869,000 worth of annual debt servicing costs in 2025.
On the capital spending, Coun. Trudy Klassen said she was finding herself in a quandary as she felt “increasingly frustrated by the lack of information that we had” during budget talks and said she would vote against all the recommendations relating to the borrowing and the alternative approval process.
“I don’t think that we have enough information at budget and even at finance and audit to do the kind of oversight that I think is important,” Klassen said.
As an example, Klassen said she appreciated the information the library provided when council asked questions during their budget presentations.
“We asked for more financial information and for them to have a more complete five-year plan and I think we need to be doing better on that on our end ourselves, on our budget,” Klassen said.
She said she didn’t think the city was fulfilling the terms of one of its sustainable financing policies, which states “each capital funding request will clearly indicate the initial cost, the future operating and replacement costs, and the estimated service life of the project and will identify the sources of sustainable funding for those costs”
In response to a question from Coun. Tim Bennett, Anderson said the estimated cost for the alternative approval process is $5,000 to $6,000.
Coun. Garth Frizzell said he recalled an AAP in Prince George meeting the threshold for rejection years ago for a proposed $50 million flood plain redesign near Cottonwood Island Park.
Yu asked whether the 50 days between notice going out to residents and the submission deadline was enough to meet the city’s obligations.
Anderson said that he tried to build in enough time for the city to get a response from the Inspector of Municipalities as they can be “quite slow getting back to us” as well as much more time than the city is legally obligated to provide.
After approving the alternate process on Feb. 3, administration has scheduled notice to go out to residents on Friday, April 4. Forms will be available to print off on the city’s website, through email or be picked up from city hall.
During votes on the 12 recommendations, Klassen was the only councillor to vote against all of them. Coun. Brian Skakun was not present at the meeting.
Completed and signed forms can be returned through email, fax, mail or in person.
Residents will be required to register their opposition by 5 p.m. on Tuesday, May 20.
