By Mat Barrett

Budget Passed

City of Melfort passes budget with smallest tax increase in years

Feb 12, 2019 | 10:35 AM

Melfort’s city council officially passed its 2019 operating budget as expected.

At the regular council meeting on Monday, Feb. 11, council officially passed the budget with a 2.09 per cent average tax increase that was mentioned at a committee of the whole meeting in January. Mayor Rick Lang said he’s happy with this year’s increase.

“It’s one of the smallest tax increases that I’ve seen since I’ve been on council since 2003,” Lang told northeastNOW. “So, a good job by administration I’ll say in coming up with some efficiencies to keep the tax increase that small.”

Council decided to go with the balancing option that spreads the increase pretty evenly throughout the different assessed properties. Residential owners will pay between 2.03 per cent and 2.10 per cent, while commercial owners will pay between 2.13 per cent and 2.23 per cent more.

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Lang said the percentages are different, but the overall increase is small between each property.

“The lowest assessed value has the least amount of overall percent increase,” he said. “But there’s very little difference between the lowest assessed residential, to the highest assessed value, and that’s the same with commercial.”

The balancing option was to help cover the just over $125,000 deficit, and Lang said council decided on these percentages because it was the most even among all properties. One of the biggest contributors to the deficit is a new seasonal position dedicated to patching in the city which is expected to cost nearly $20,000.

The 2018 budget had a tax increase of 3.14 per cent.

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mat.barrett@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @matbarrett6