Next week, town council is will consider whether or not to approve Sackville’s proposed 2021 budget.
Last week, on October 26, 2020, council met to discuss and ask questions about the draft budget prepared by staff and presented by treasurer Michael Beal.
Councillors had been asked to submit questions in advance, but most did not. The standout was councillor Shawn Mesheau, whose list of questions shaped the conversation for the meeting, on everything from ice fees to economic development to gas taxes.
Erica Butler spoke with Councillor Mesheau on October 28, 2020 to find out more.
TRANSCRIPT (with minor edits for clarity):
ERICA BUTLER:
At last Monday’s meeting, you had a number of questions heading into that. We might not have time to cover them all, but are there some of those questions that stand out to you as warranting further consideration?
SHAWN MESHEAU:
Well, that’s what’s good about this, is the opportunity for council to start discussing these one-offs next year, as they come up. As the recommendations come forward from staff it will allow some more debate.
I think one of the things that we struggle with as a municipality is our economic growth opportunity. And one of the things I was striving to get focus on Monday evening was… We continue to talk about the equalization formula and how it’s affecting our community. However, we don’t focus on the core funding and what drives that core funding.
The way I look at this is you have to look at what you can and cannot control. We can’t control the equalization formula, it’s set in place. We can lobby to have it changed. However, with the core funding component, it’s driven by our commercial development. And as you saw this year, because of commercial development that happened previously, we saw a growth in our core funding. Now we’ll see a drop next year, because the government assessment has dropped for commercial properties. However, going forward, if we put more emphasis on that commercial investment and growth, it’ll pay off for our community, not only tax base-wise and core funding, but for our ability to attract people and, and have sustainable employment here.
EB:
One of the things you asked about was Renaissance Sackville, which has an envelope of $25,000 to spend. It’s an interesting organization, and I’m just learning about it myself. It started as sort of a community development initiative, and then has been asked to also now focus on economic development. I don’t want to put words in your mouth, but your questioning may have indicated that we should be looking at rolling Renaissance Sackville funding into a wider economic development plan. Is that correct?
SM:
Well, I guess one of the suggestions that was was made in regards to our business development strategy that Council adopted was the formation of a roundtable on economic development. And we haven’t leveraged that. We haven’t moved forward on that. So I know that from indications from staff and from council, there seems to be an interest to see that move forward more in the future.
And as we look at this next year, where we haven’t gotten into it, my thoughts are, so where will it lead us? This funding through Renaissance is funding that they utilize for grants. And it’s all determined at the time as the applications come forward, and they present the council, and council will have an opportunity to input on it.
However, we don’t want to give a false sense to organizations that they are necessarily the catalyst to be part of our economic growth down the road.
One thing about Renaissance Sackville, it was actually created back in the mid 90s, probably 94-95. It was an economic driving force. In fact, I sat on the very first think tank that happened at the university. I was an employee of Atlantic Wholesalers, which was moving its head office. We had seen, you know, the foundries close. We had seen our RCMP crime lab leave. So there was a kind of a bleed of jobs going on.
So when Renaissance was initially formed through this conversation at the think tank, it was an economic driver. It was not just about providing a means for funding for local business. It was a catalyst in order to attract investment in Sackville. And the monies provided to it by the municipality were there to help with that, to help create that investment, to help find further money.
And its mandate has changed, even though if you go on their website, you’ll see how they were structured. It was a great structure. It had representation from from several areas. I mean, you’re talking the farming community… you know, it had all these different sectors.
Its focus has changed. And its focus is still great, however, I my question is, should we compile that into one line item under economic growth and development? And then as we further
work towards how we’re going to tackle this, and we develop mechanisms within that, then is Renaissance a mechanism that will be part of that so that we can move things forward? So that’s what my thoughts were on it.
EB:
One of the other things that you had asked about was ice fees. We weren’t privy to the council priorities discussion but ice fees was something brought up by some of the groups in the public budget meeting. Then council had its own internal meeting. And it’s certainly something mentioned in this budget, in terms of there being this ‘council initiatives’ fund with the suggestion that some of it could go to subsidize ice fees and/or go to a skate park study.
You had asked a couple questions about ice fees specifically relating to Sackville’s revenue in terms of ice fees. What are your thoughts on ice fees? Do you think that there’s room for us to give up some of that revenue?
SM:
I was trying to get information in regards to actually how much revenue we’re generating from youth programming.
Our neighbour to the east, Amherst, has really been kind of a catalyst on becoming an active community. And one of their approaches was providing no fees to youth programming when it came to their ice rentals. In their case, to drive that activity.
From what I heard from the groups that presented to council was they’re having a hard time encouraging some of our youth to be involved. It’s a high cost for anyone.
When I was a kid growing up at hockey, we didn’t have those all those safety features that are in place, and the equipment was pretty sparse. And there was always an expense, there was a registration fee. However, now it’s kind of growing and then the cost of ice is growing. So how do we, as a municipality, encourage that type of activity to continue? Helping these organizations be competitive and have affordable registration?
We hand out our grants, and we hand out a grant to minor hockey, and to the skating club. Are we reaching the people who need that help? And how do you make that determination? I know each organization does their thing in order to ensure folks who can’t afford, are included. But what more can we be doing as a municipality? And I wanted to get a dollar figure around it. And I believe the treasurer indicated that it was about $95,000, that was generated through youth programming, excluding the high school programs. And so it allowed me to get a better understanding as to the figure that they had provided in regards to the budget that might be able to be used towards a fee structure that’s more in line with with helping them.
And I look forward to discussing that more with council as a whole and seeing the reports coming back from staff on some options that we might be able to look at.
So, but that’s what my focus was. I think we need to make a move on this. And I think it overall would enhance our community.
EB:
It’s interesting that the two skating groups, the Sackville skating club and minor hockey, both pointed to Amherst and the lower ice fees there. Because interestingly enough, the skate park people also point to Amherst. It’s a popular skate park over there. So both of the items listed as potential funding items for that council initiatives fund… We’re looking to Amherst as sort of the gold standard.
SM:
And I think the thing is, how do we [fit into it]?
I mean, we don’t don’t have the the population base that Amherst has, that utilizes these, but at the same end, how do we continue to have Sackville as a place that people want to live? What’s attracting them to live here in Sackville? Are they coming here for work? Are they coming here to live because it’s close to Amherst, it’s close to Moncton.
And so then they’re making a decision. Okay, if I’m working in Amherst, what is it in Amherst that they have that might be different from Sackville? It’s only a small commute. So
what is their activity wise? Is there things that my kids could be involved with more? Is that available in Sackville?
So it’s not necessarily getting to their level, but at the same end being responsible and saying, okay, are we doing enough?
I’ve been in customer service, in food service most of my life, and I look at a role of municipalities… You know, you’re paying for services, so how are we delivering? How are we doing? Are there improvements that we can make? And are there things that we can do away with that we don’t need any longer?
EB:
I wanted to ask you about two different things, but they’re sort of related. You had asked a question about gas taxes about whether we, as a municipality, would be free to spend gas tax funding being funnelled via the province, if we would be able to spend that on things like making our buildings more energy efficient, or switching over to renewable forms of energy, and fleet replacement and that sort of thing. So sort of climate change related stuff, but also cost savings related stuff.
The other related thing was that you also asked about our climate change initiative funding. Does climate change need some space in this budget? Is Sackville doing enough to really put those things front and centre?
SM:
Well, I think with anything, there’s always room for improvement, right?
The way I look at it is, I look at tangible things. And it’s not necessarily about having a person that’s focused on specifically, climate change initiatives. I think it’s about actually putting a plan in place and making it work. You know, that’s why the creation of the roundtable on climate change… It goes back to, do you declare a climate emergency? And what does that actually accomplish? Or do we actually action things and actually come up with funding on things that we control?
You know, as a municipality, our limitation is what can we do as a municipality on our own structures, on our equipment, whatever it might be, to be better at helping our climate and being more sustainable.
The rest of it goes, the way I look at it, beyond our mandate.
We have a community that’s very focused on that, and so are there things we can be doing? And again, I reference our neighbours to the east. They retrofitted their arena with solar panels. Now Nova Scotia has, through their power company, different programs in place that they’re able to access. If we could do the same here, and we can do more lobbying in that case.
At the same time, $25,000… I’m just curious as to the thought process, where would it go? And, to be honest, I’ve had some not-so-positive feedback about spending $25,000 on public art to do with climate change.
And I think people are thinking, well, what can we do that’s actually helping with climate change? And I get that every day. Even as a person myself, like, what can I be doing? And what can I afford to do? And that’s the biggest challenge. So as a municipality, what can we afford to do? And what will benefit our footprint on making things a little more sustainable?
So that’s, that’s my thought process. It’s not necessarily that we’re not, you know, heading in the right direction. It’s more so, how can we do more, sooner? And does the option exist?
So that’s what I was trying to get at is, you know, are we tied in to this choice of where we’re spending that gas tax funding right now? Or is there flexibility? And I think the treasurer answered that very well. And so I kind of look forward to talking about more.
EB:
Let’s recap there, because I was listening to that same meeting, and the answer from the treasurer was basically, we had decided in the past that we would spend our gas tax funding on paving roads, but we’re not tied to that in the future, basically.
Is that what you got out of it?
SM:
Yeah, and I think the way he’s talking is that, you know, we’ve incorporated it into our capital budget. So if it just means moving numbers around, as opposed to actually changing the determination… So we still spend X amount of dollars on paving, but we utilize maybe more dollars or other dollars maybe in another initiative, whether it’s a retrofit of buildings that we have with solar, whatever it might be.
So I think the options are there. And as you talk about our budget, nothing ever is ever set in stone.
So I mean, at any point in time, if it’s the will of council to say, okay, you know something, we’ve looked at this… It’s like with the dog park last year. There was an interest to add that to the budget. It was there. But when it came right down to it, and council had the option to look at what had been presented and the dollar figure around it, and get more public feedback, then it’s like, ‘yeah, you know something, maybe this isn’t the time.’
So who’s to know in 2021? And then come May of 2021, there’ll be a different council, or members of council. There might be some folks coming in there saying maybe we need to pivot a little here, and take a different approach on a couple of things.
EB:
Interesting. So the budget, as you say, is not set in stone, things could change. And even a lot of the questions that you had were regarding envelopes where we don’t exactly know how that money will be spent.
SM:
And that’s the thing. I guess they call it budget deliberations, but really, it’s more, here’s the money, here’s where staff is saying we need to allocate it. The treasurer says there’s keeping the lights on, and then what are the extras?
So my questions were more focused on the ‘what ifs’, and ‘can we?’ And getting a little more detail around those numbers and how they’re spread out over the different areas.
My questions in regards to IT services and our legal services, you know, what’s the healthy practice around that? Should we be reviewing those every four years, every five years? Just to make sure that we’re getting the best dollar value and the best service that we can. If there’s somebody else out there that could provide the service at less cost, or provide a different service at more cost. What are our needs as a municipality? And those needs change. So that’s the type of conversation that we need to have.
And, again, council directs it all. Staff make recommendations back. But, you know, a lot of those things that I’ve raised are things that I think need to stay in the forefront. Things that I think need to be discussed as we head into 2021. And hopefully, council will agree and we’ll get the opportunity to talk about it some more.
