Beaconsfield holds budget consultation

BY ELYSE AMEND

elyse.amend@transcontinental.ca

For the second year in a row, the City of Beaconsfield held its public consultation on the preliminary budget on Monday to allow citizens and associations to make their suggestions on what council could do better. While attendance was lower than last year, several residents and association representatives trickled in throughout the seven hours set aside for the consultation to address members of the council.

The preliminary 2008 budget is forecasted at just over $21.3 million, which is up $400,000, or 1.77 per cent, from the $20.9 million 2007 budget. According to Beaconsfield Mayor Bob Benedetti, council took several factors into account when developing the proposed budget: debt service will be reduced by $50,000 and actuarial deficit by $100,000. The budget forecasts revenue increases through the welcome tax (up $350,000), permits (up $35,000), fines (up $40,000) and user fees (up $25,000).

In order to improve services, the city estimates an increase in expenses for the municipal patrol, which will have its hours extended from 18 to 24 hours per day (up $100,000), drainage (up $125,000), tree pruning and maintenance of the urban forest (up $200,000), legal fees (up $75,000) and staff for the city’s infrastructure and environment projects (up $70,000).

“We’re aiming to improve services while reducing taxes,” Benedetti said.

After experimenting with four branch pick-ups last year, at a cost of $50,793, Beaconsfield will be moving back to six pick-ups per year in 2008, at a cost of $90,376, a raise of $39,583.

“We experimented with four, and it didn’t work. Beaconsfield looked like a branch-dump. So, we’re going back to a larger branch pick-up,” Benedetti said. The city will also be spending an extra $200,000 to subcontract tree maintenance in 2008. “We also had a huge problem with our tree pruning. We have a huge urban forest, probably the biggest per capita on the island. We probably have more trees than people in Beaconsfield and we’ve been falling behind.”

Many organizations, such as the Beaconsfield Hooking Crafters Guild, Beaconsfield Quilters Guild and the Beaconsfield Artists Association, voiced their concerns and questions about user fees for the city’s buildings, as they are mostly non-profit community organizations with little money to spend.

The Beaconsfield Citizens Association (BCA) also attended the evening session of the consultation to show its frustration with the proposed budget.

“We haven’t cut expenses and we haven’t cut taxes,” said BCA president Karin Essen. “There’s nothing original in this budget at all. It’s almost a carbon copy of last year’s budget. The major reductions the mayor is talking about, like debt service and actuarial deficit, nobody has control over. Those aren’t things council could have controlled in the first place, and there are a lot of things they could control.”

The BCA compared the city to St. Lambert on the South Shore, which, like Beaconsfield, had their taxes hiked following the municipal demergers in 2006.

“In the past two years they’ve managed to cut their expenses down and lower their taxes, whereas we haven’t here. So it can be done,” Essen said, adding council should re-evaluate some of their raised expenses in the 2008 budget. “We’re not saying cut taxes at the expense of services. There’s a quality of life that needs to be maintained […] It’s easy to say high taxes are all the agglomeration’s fault. It’s not. We have a budget here that we can control ourselves and there’s lots you can do if you’re creative and innovative.”

To see the complete 2008 proposed budget overview, visit the City of Beaconsfield’s website at www.beaconsfield.ca. To see the BCA’s brief submitted at the budget consultation, visit www.bca-acb.org.