qathet Regional District officials deliberate cost-cutting plans

qathet Regional District’s (qRD) finance committee took an extensive look at items in the third draft of its 2024 to 2028 financial plan, considering whether to include 39 items in the draft.

At the committee’s February 6 meeting, Electoral Area E director and committee chair Andrew Fall said there were no easy cuts to make.

“Cuts to costs mean cuts to services – that’s basically the bottom line,” said Fall. “Those are political decisions and we can do that.”

Fall said the items for consideration were options, not recommendations.

qRD manager of financial services Linda Greenan said the draft before the committee was different than previous drafts.

“This draft is based on the 2024 completed roll values [from BC Assessment], whereas the other drafts that you saw were based on the 2023 revised roll values,” said Greenan. “There’s an overall decrease in assessed values of 4.23 per cent overall.”

In reviewing the services the regional district offers, Greenan said the bulk of the increases were inflationary. She said in general administration, there was an increase of $131,455 and the biggest driver was borrowing to purchase office space for the construction of a new boardroom, which will be in compliance with the new Accessible British Columbia Act.

There is also an increase of $1,248,758 in waste management related to the resource recovery and transfer station that is coming online in 2024. Full debt payments begin this year and will be paid for a 30-year term with the municipal finance authority. There are also new staff wages to be paid, and a net increase to waste, recycling and organics programs.

Greenan then reviewed city tax assessments, with 49 per cent being allocated to the municipal general tax levy. She said 7.64 per cent of the tax bill goes to qRD. She said she wanted to talk about the 36 per cent tax increase for city taxpayers for qRD assessments.

Greenan said because the qRD portion of taxes is only 7.64 per cent, it works out to a tax increase of 2.78 per cent for the regional district services.

“If you are a property owner in the City of Powell River, that’s about $127 per average household for the year,” said Greenan.

A large item in the budget was the operation of the various recycling centres throughout qathet region. Directors had the option of providing the contractor with notice of contract termination for the Black Point, Van Anda, Gillies Bay, Tla’amin and Lund recycling centres, but voted to keep them in the 2024 budget.

Another large item was the parks acquisition reserve fund. Directors had the option of directing staff to eliminate the $183,000 budget for the annual contribution to the parks acquisition reserve. Directors voted by a narrow margin to keep the parks acquisition reserve contribution in the budget. Electoral Area C director Clay Brander, City of Powell River alternate director Trina Isakson, Electoral Area D director Sandy McCormick and Fall voted to maintain the contribution.

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