The City of New Westminster is fleshing out the details on how its strategic priorities and its finances will mesh in its budget.
While all of city council’s strategic priorities are important, a staff report about the draft 2020 to 2024 capital plan said key areas now being emphasized include affordable housing, child care, reconciliation, climate action, public realm and sustainable transportation. The senior management team at city hall has reviewed the proposed capital program and wants to create a framework for evaluating and aligning council’s strategic priorities with a sustainable capital program.
“A sustainable capital program is defined as a balance between the city’s ability to pay, its ability to deliver within the suggested time frames and current staff resources, and advancement across the various strategic priorities,” said a report considered by council at a Sept. 30 workshop.
The City of New Westminster kicked off the budget process with a workshop where it started to consider how to make its strategic plan into a reality – recognizing there are financial impacts.
Colleen Ponzini, the city’s director of finance, said there’s “much more work” to be done to the budget. She said the public will have a chance to weigh in with their opinions on the options as they come forward for council’s consideration.
Coun. Patrick Johnstone said he feels it’s really important the city put a climate-impact lens on all of the projects being considered. He said a district energy project in Sapperton and a replacement facility for Canada Games Pool are both capital projects that would have “significant impacts” on reducing greenhouse gases.
Mayor Jonathan Cote said he thinks climate change will blend into a number of different areas of the budget.
Coun. Mary Trentadue said there’s clearly too much to be done for the city to do it all.
“I am looking for that conversation where we talk about what we are not going to do,” she said.
Ponzini said staff is currently at an “in between step” with this year’s budget and will be coming back to council to get more input.
Once the city has a more defined capital program, Ponzini said the city will need to make sure it has the operating resources, particularly the staff, to do that work. She noted staff resources are part of the operating budget, which impacts the tax rate.
“It is always an issue of concern for the public,” she said of tax increases. “We want to make sure we keep the rates down.”
Ponzini said staff will have a better idea of the proposed 2020 tax in November or December, in advance of setting the tax rate next spring.
