A further look by Chair Bob Gale and staff dropped the increase to 6.3%
It's official, Niagara taxpayers to fork out even less this year, after the region passed a 6.3% budget increase, instead of a 6.98-percent increase.
Chair Bob Gale, and staff, managed to find another $3-million in savings, which included another $850,000 from police.
Councillor Bill Steele wanted to reach 5.5% increase. "Quite frankly, through the whole budget process and my 25 years of doing municipal budgets, and I've said this before... we keep tripping over nickels and dimes to save pennies. I think we need to really look at our budgets, we need to take this term to set the table for next year's budget."
Chief Adminstrative Officer Ron Tripp added they looked at how to achieve a 3.5% increase, a very difficult task.
Councillor Mat Siscoe likes to avoid using funding reserves to drop taxes. "The only way we are actually going to find lasting savings for the Niagara community, is undergo a core services review, and make difficult decisions on what lines of business we should be in, and what we shouldn't be in."
The CAO asked if an item is not a legislative requirement, why do it?
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