In December we called on council to scrimp and save on the 2014 operating budget, and on Tuesday scrimp and save it did.
Between its own efforts and the efforts of municipal directors, the 2014 tax increase was cut by more than four percentage points, bringing it down to 2.05 per cent.
In layman鈥檚 terms, that equates to a $39.25 tax increase for a homeowner with a property assessed at $750,000. That鈥檚 down from the $120 increase that was proposed when the draft operating budget was presented late last year.
For this, council and administration deserve a round of applause.
Budgeting isn鈥檛 an easy process. In fact, it can be a painful one鈥攁s Coun. Rico Damota put it: it鈥檚 a bit like sitting in a dentist鈥檚 chair or chewing on tinfoil. But, the truth is, someone鈥檚 gotta do it. And fortunately for Jasper, the community has elected officials who were willing to go line-by-line through each and every page of the town鈥檚 operating budget, hunting for things to slash and burn.
Without those dedicated people, the town would be looking at the 6.38 per cent tax increase that was proposed three months ago, and business and homeowners would rightfully be up in arms.
So all in all this is a success story for the municipality.
But, that doesn鈥檛 mean there isn鈥檛 room for improvement鈥攔oom to make the process a little less painful.
Because let us tell you, it was painful.
Anyone who sat through the deliberations would have to agree on that fact. It truly was like a trip to the dentist.
During last week鈥檚 committee-of-the-whole meeting, council talked in circles for hours upon hours without coming to concrete decisions. By the end of the seven hour day, there were ideas of how to cut the budget, but they hadn鈥檛 been solidified or agreed upon.
So, when it came time to vote on the budget Feb. 18, there was still a lot for council to discuss, and that resulted in another four hour meeting, as council yet again hashed out all of the possible cuts.
This process, although effective in the end, proved inefficient and was enough to get Coun. Damota 鈥渉ot under the collar.鈥�
Following the vote on the budget, Damota鈥攚ho voted against the motion because of the inefficiency of the process鈥攙oiced his hopes that in future years, council will learn from this year鈥檚 stumbles.
We can only hope the same. Because, goodness knows, we can only handle two visits to the dentist chair a year.
