Jan Harder thinks it’s time for city councillors to start dancing.
“Next November is an election year,” says the Barrhaven councillor.
“Usually people are climbing all over themselves to do the ‘taxpayers-would-like-you-to-behave’ dance. It’s not. It’s like [the councillors think] they’re here for life or something.”
Councillors’ political lives could end just 12 months from now. Ottawa will elect a new council on Nov. 8, 2010. That means the upcoming budget debate is their last chance to prove they deserve reelection.
But it won’t be an easy task.
The economic slowdown and unanticipated expenses will make this year’s budget especially difficult. For the next three months, council will decide which city projects will go ahead this year and which will be delayed or cut.
“Every year there are challenges,” says Somerset Coun. Diane Holmes. “This year the economy is down so we lost some tax revenue.”
The Ottawa-Gatineau region lost approximately 26,000 jobs during the first five months of 2009, Statistics Canada estimates. However, the region regained 1,400 jobs in June and recovery has continued ever since.
Council will also face a long list of items that will eat away at the budget from the beginning of the debate.
One expensive item in the 2010 budget is the North-South Light-Rail Transit settlement. In September, council agreed to pay $36.7 million in damages to the builder of the cancelled LRT system, Siemens/PCL/Dufferin. Council advanced funds from the upcoming budget to pay the settlement.
The city will also have to pay for the settlement from the winter bus strike, which is “quite high,” Holmes says.
OC Transpo employee salaries will have to increase 8.25 per cent over three years, following an arbitration board ruling.
The city currently spends about $198 million annually on their wages and benefits. Holmes said the city’s legal fees from the strike were substantial, and would also come out of the 2010 budget.
“We’ll be wanting to invest in sewers and water [systems],” Holmes adds, “to make sure that we keep on trying to get our sewer problems fixed.”
On July 24 heavy rainfall flooded nearly 300 Kanata-area homes. It was the community’s fourth flood in 13 years.
Councillors have promised to improve water management systems in that region to prevent future floods. At the time, those improvements were estimated to cost more than $30 million.
To accommodate these multi-million dollar expenses, council may have to cut previously approved expenditures.
Holmes says that happened last year, when a five-year $26-million cycling plan was ignored.
“Council has approved [the plan]. The funding plan is there as well. And last year we didn’t put any money into it,” she says. Although the promise is there, “we don’t always follow through.”
The mayor is planning to approach this budget process as any other.
“The election year shouldn’t really play a major role in the discussions,” says Mayor Larry O’Brien. He says he has not yet decided whether he will run again for mayor in 2010.
Other councillors are also keeping quiet about their plans for the upcoming election.
The only dancing they’ve been doing lately, has been around that question.