Okay Monty, what’s behind door # 1 ?

I’ll tell you whats behind that door, 30,000 home owners being bent over. 15% hike, how much mismanagement do you have to do to be that far off the mark.

Whats with the 25% surplus for unexpected expenses, so that they can rob this coffer at future date to build nothing related to what it was suppose to be for.

You want to raise money, issue bonds.

Might as well get started right off the bat.

“The actual business on the agenda is light.”

Light?

We have street lights on our street. Are they going to be charging us for that too? :-)

Maybe if we had a PAC it would offset some of the increases as it would bring in fives and tens of people from the Hart and maybe as far away as Hixon. All the money they would spent in town would have all kinds of spinoff effects thereby increasing the tax money going to Cityhall!!!

“At issue is the aging infrastructure, and a desire to have the services self sustaining with a reserve of 25% to cover unexpected capital expenses.”

I think the last time we faced that notion of self sustainability of city services was when the taxes were raised by an annual increment so that road maintenance paving would not be paid for by borrowing money to cover those costs.

Do we have a list of other such situations which are still outstanding in this City that Administration is aware of and Council has approved to bring forward over a period of time so as not to hit us with a whopping tax increase?

If so, we ought to be told the details of what we can expect.

If not, is it because no one has looked into that? If that is the case, would Council please instruct Administration to look into it and bring back a report so that we know what this City can look forward to.

The time for discussion on this is over. Time for action on this one, as far as I am concerned.

Rumour has it from a city worker the break in the water line at the complex at the corner of Ospika and Davis was caused by the wrong pipe being used. If in fact that is true so much for the inspection dept.

I wonder if the City is still persuing mandatory water metering. There’s another cash cow waiting to be born.

Wrong pipe? Possibly plastic pipe was used for water distribution which is causing the City problems and they are supposedly not using anymore. However, they are expecting increases in maintenance costs over the years.

Also, with respect to metering, all new developments will have meters.

Here is the full report to Council. Very interesting to read.
http://princegeorge.ca/cityhall/mayorcouncil/councilagendasminutes/agendas/2011/2011_12_05/documents/Cmte_FandA_Water_Sewer_Ops_rpt_MERGED.pdf

According to the report, of 36 municipalities across the country ranging in water charges of $637 to $111 we are 30th highest.

After the 4 years proposed increases we will be paying $532.6 which is a 72% increase over the current rate. If no one changes ther rates to be higher than ours at thsat time, we will be the 5th most expensive City for water charges.

The real question that ought ot be addressed is how are all those cities on the list dealing with their aging infrastructure? In other words, are their costs less than ours because they are not addressing future maintenance and are those cities with some of the highest rates addressing their maintenance costs in a realistic way?

The report seems to deal only with what is being paid rather than why.

There is another little tidbit in the Council Package that I noticed. It is Shari Green’s short report on some sessions at UBCM which she attended. Here is what she wrote on one:

“Also attended the Forest Economy session. Population losses in the north, but generate more income per capita. New opportunities in forest agriculture, bio-pharmaceuticals, and non timber botanicals. Need to get out of our silos.”

The reason I raise that is that I am particularly interested in the bio-pharmaceuticals opportunities since I have raised that prospect on 250 a few times over the years since I first heard about the interest raised by Asians visiting the office IPG had a few years ago in the Vancouver world trade offices.

So, we have a recurring theme here. I am interested to know what, if anything, we are doing about it? How has this City been working with IPG, the Province, the Feds, companies and organizations working in the pharmaceutical clusters, investors from Asia, etc. to pursue this avenue, especially in the light of a new light industrial/business/research park developing at the airport serviced by the new Boundary Rd. and our improved transportation capacity at the airport as well as through the Port of Prince Rupert.

I think this is the time for a community discussion of how well Council is dealing with the “open for business” notion.

Water fees: For every $100 you are paying now you will be paying $171.86!

Sewer fees: For every $100 you are paying now it will be $182.60!

Add to that the regular increases for garbage collection, annual increases in property taxes, plus the extra tax levy for the 2015 Winter Games…

…well, as if it wasn’t totally predictable!

The sodium fluoride is getting more expensive to buy and truck in as well, so that’s probably another reason for increasing the water fees.

Thanks, looks like we are in the silos for good.

Here we go folks. Hang on to your hats. Nothing has changed because of the election and not likely to. This is only the beginning and they have not even done anything to property tax yet. They had all the answers before the election. Oh yes raise the taxes. People don’t mind paying increases when they get something for it. Yeah Right.

Didn’t Shari just finish campaigning on cutting all costs by 10%?

One more thing I noticed. The Summary and Conclusion of the report states the following:

“Council has a strategic priority for continuing progressive and responsible fiscal management. The sewer utility service and infrastructure should be funded through fees paid by the users of the service.”

The last sentence is one I agree with it in principle. However, I am wondering whether it the property taxes and user fees are properly applied to support that principle.

Those who have property in the community pay both property taxes as well as user fees.

I believe I am correct that property assessments are based in part on the City services provided to a property.

Thus, in terms of the City providing water and sewer services to an urban property and none to a rural property, a rural property should be assessed at less than the urban property for that portion of the evaluation which takes servicing into account. In other words, if there are those services on one street for a half acre lot and there are not on the adjacent street for the same sized lot, then the lot with services would be assessed at a higher value than the lot without.

So, the lot with services not only has a higher property tax, but also pays for the use of the services.

If, however, the principle in the conclusion is a valid one, then all lots where that principle is applied, which should be all lots in the City, ought to be assessed without consideration of which services are supplied. Only in that way would there be a level playing field. As it is, if tht is in fact the way it is, the rural lots without services are being subsidized by those who pay user fees.

At least, that is the way it looks like to me. Perhaps someone has more details on this which would clarify that issue.

Oooops … one more thing :-)

So far the costs of infrastructure maintenance has been funded in part through user fees and in part through tax increases where there has been a short fall. Again, it is an assumption I am making since we really do not have a good reporting out on project or program costs that are easy to locate and to understand by the average taxpayer.

If that assumption is true, then as we move to a purer user pay system in the case of the infrastructure build-operate-maintain continuum, our property tax portion of “taxation” should be reduced at least on a proportional basis if not on a real basis.

True cost accounting applied to taxation. ;-)

“Didn’t Shari just finish campaigning on cutting all costs by 10%?”

Nope.

She campaigned on asking Administration to come back with departmental budgets with a 10% cut in each.

Council would then look at those and make some decisions based on what those proposals would mean.

There is quite a difference. However, far to subtle a distinction. The interpretations of her words were, of course, many.

One just has to read the city’s annual report for the last few years to see that they have been underfunding infrastructure maintenance for years. At one time this upkeep was properly funded but previous councils, I’m looking at you Colin, cut it so pet projects could be built without raising taxes too much. Those chickens are now coming home to roost.

Root cause yet again…….failure to know the difference between WANTS and NEEDS.

If the city still had the 900k it paid for airspace or the 500k for hotel flipping in their coffers it would go a long way to ease the pain.

Isn’t it strange that after all these years after the infrastructure was installed that finally we need a reserve fund for maintenance.

It will be interesting to see if our new council will question these increases as some have told us it would be a priority to do so.

And thanks Gus for all the good information you have provided. You should try for a job with CP or one of the big media networks.
Cheers

How can the new members on council vote of something so important without having been on council yet? Shouldn’t they have some time to acclimatize themselves?

“How can the new members on council vote of something so important without having been on council yet?”

Because they are for all intents and purposes rubber stamps for Bates and his cronies.

Here us an example 2011 rates: now remember, this lot is not on City sewer & water, The road is plowed at least 6 times a winter and no more. Property is in city limits. Note for 2015 winter games it states Facility Improvements – not new facilities! The property area has not had a new road done on street only patching in the past 25 years and 3/4 of the streets in the area are still gravel.

School .315500
BC Assessment .06210
Fr. Frt George Hospital .37838
Municipal Finance Authority .00020
Regional District .54353
Regional District 911 .14849
General Municipal Purposes 6.70534
Road Rehabilitation Reserve .29661
Snow removel Cost Reserve .49895
2015 Winter Games Fac.Improvements .12953

So to say the least – what do we want to gamble that the increases will be another $200 and/or more? The house and property is only worth $173,000.

Oh, and don’t forget the owner only has a small garbage can. No bus service. So who is subsidizing who? We have less schools and less students nowadays…..
If you get your streets plowed more – then you can pay for it. Why is Regional District getting more than anything else besides the General Municipal Purposes?

Just asking………

Yep, I think Kinsley was by far the worst mayor we ever had in terms of fiscal mismanagement, but nobody saw it at the time.

Rogers was not great, but he had to deal with the mismanagement of Kinsley and he paid the price at election time. And now we’re still playing catch up with Shari Green.

I love the sentence in this article which states: “The actual business on the agenda is light.”

LOL …..

Fresh out of the gate ….. a whopping “user fee” tax increase.

The excuses are easy …..

1. “Not our doing” ….. the fault of poor fiscal management by several past Councils.

True, we are not the only City which has taken that approach. In fact, it is standard practice throughout the country. Not best practice, just standard practice. Also poor practice from a sustainability point of view.

2. “We have to bite the bullet and do the right thing. We will transition from the old to the new over the next 3 years of our term. We believe that we can hold property taxes and even reduce them in 2011 dollar terms by placing the user costs where they belong, the user”

Let’s look “outside the box”. My friend lives outside city limits where it is necessary to have a well and lagoon as she does not have the benefit of City Services or a City crew to attend to any maintenance or emergency situations that may come up.

The average cost to put in a well and lagoon today is $25,000 paid up front without the benefit of semi- annual, interest free payments.

If an average City of Prince George Water Bill is $309.96 annually and an average City of Prince George Sewer Bill is $253.68 annually that equates to $563.64 annually for the average household.

Some math:

$25,000/$563.64 = 44.35 so it would take approximately 44 years of paying 563.64 per annum to pay off the initial investment. This is assuming the rates remained the same, of course they won’t so let’s assume the average over the time period was increased to $1000.00 per annum:

$25,000/$1000 = 25 so it would take approximately 25 years of paying $1000.00 per annum to pay off the initial investment.

To be fair we should look at the interest the rural home owner has lost because they had to put out the initial $25,000 up front expenditure, ( not allowing for any maintenance costs).

Loan Amount $25,000
Interest Rate 5.00% (flat rate)
Term 25 Years

Payment $1,774 annually

Call me a softy but can you honestly say you think the City is doing us a disservice. I personally think I should count myself lucky.

Let’s look “outside the box”. My friend lives outside city limits where it is necessary to have a well and lagoon as she does not have the benefit of City Services or a City crew to attend to any maintenance or emergency situations that may come up.

The average cost to put in a well and lagoon today is $25,000 paid up front without the benefit of semi- annual, interest free payments.

If an average City of Prince George Water Bill is $309.96 annually and an average City of Prince George Sewer Bill is $253.68 annually that equates to $563.64 annually for the average household.

Some math:

$25,000/$563.64 = 44.35 so it would take approximately 44 years of paying 563.64 per annum to pay off the initial investment. This is assuming the rates remained the same, of course they won’t so let’s assume the average over the time period was increased to $1000.00 per annum:

$25,000/$1000 = 25 so it would take approximately 25 years of paying $1000.00 per annum to pay off the initial investment.

To be fair we should look at the interest the rural home owner has lost because they had to put out the initial $25,000 up front expenditure, ( not allowing for any maintenance costs).

Loan Amount $25,000
Interest Rate 5.00% (flat rate)
Term 25 Years

Payment $1,774 annually

Call me a softy but can you honestly say you think the City is doing us a disservice. I personally think I should count myself lucky.

Gus – here is a s piece of information from the city website you mentioned.

Can someone tell me why it shows and states; Water mains repairs:
2009 copper 118 repairs
2010 copper 113 repairs

2009 plastic 17 repairs
2010 plastic 18 repairs

does someone not know what the difference between copper and plastic is or did they get their numbers mixed up. The city says more repairs due to plastic in the 80’s and 90’s so what gives?

Lots more copper in the ground.

OutsidetheBox….your story only pertains to someone that is actually installing a well and lagoon. If one buys property with all that already done, the only expense would be the maintenance. A far cry from your calcs.

OutsidetheBox – maybe look at the whole pitcure………

If the lot I was mentioning was to be able to hook up with water and sewer it would costs another $80,000.00 minimum (based on projected costs 10 years ago) added to the value over the period of the taxes from this property as it stands today……..drastically raising the taxes. never mind the added cost to the homeowner to hook up. This is one reason the people bought the property to keep costs down.

Oh, and by the way, in areas outside the city limits it is in the cost of buying/building the house – which is taxed at a much cheaper rate than in the city. You get taxed more on improvements after the house has been built. I have acreage outside of city limits and can guarantee it did not cost the amounts you mentioned yearly. Also the maintenance is less than paying for city services.

But then again the property taxes on the owner depends on their wants and needs. If you want the oversized house & property you pay.

Dragonmaster – your comment does not consider that buying a property with a lagoon and well installed would be considerably more expensive than the same property without.

Another example of how the administration does not think through a problem thoroughly.In areas of the city that have ditches instead of storm sewers it is now policy not to remove the accumulated snow in the spring to allow for runoff. As a result most roads have standing water on them and in the freeze/thaw cycles in the early spring guess what is happening to the pavement…………yup breaking up. So is there any actual money saved, sure the snow clearing budget will be lower but the paving and patching budget will go up more.

Now I am glad that I voted for only one incumbent councillor and 4 new faces, including a new mayor (not Green)!

“Didn’t Shari just finish campaigning on cutting all costs by 10%?”

Survey says: Next municipal elections will be held on 1st of April.

Not only is there a lot more copper in the ground, the copper that is in the ground is also a lot older.

In other words, the sevice life of copper is longer than the service life of plastic.

And no one examines the mill rates……….residential vs industrial?? And the changes that were made on that front??

Is one to assume then if they were before the 80’s & 90’s. In the bowl area only?

Does anyone know where these 118 and 113 copper pipe diggings were? Not on the city website and I was put on hold at City Hall………

I know of one place where the main was worked on at the same place 2 years in a row in the bowl area.

outside thebox, you are partially correct in the cost of supplying water in the rural area, if you want to drill a well it is $25-$30 thousand, but you can install a cistern and haul water or get it delivered, this would be much cheaper. the cost to dig a lagoon is about the same, depending on the size requirements. Yes it is not cheap, but the land is a lot cheaper than a city lot, and you usually have some acreage, fresh air, no pulp smell etc.

I live in Pineview and get water from the District at a cost of $13.20 p/m plus an annual tax of $145.20. I like living just outside the city Iam not subjected to the ever increases in taxes the city subjects you to and for what, it never seems to be enough.

From the mill rates posted by guesswhat:

Regional District .54353

So, for a $225,000 property assessment, that means $122.29 goes to the Regional District. The $225,000 is roughly the average house.

So you say you are only paying $145.20 for tax in the Regional District ……

hmmmmm …..

Gus, your last post. you state, “So you say you are only paying $145.20 for tax in the Regional district” gus if you are referring to my post I should clarify. The $145.20 per year is paid to the Pineview Improvement district as part of our water tax, paid once per year and then $13.20 p/m. My property taxes are paid to the Regional district.

Gus, your last post. you state, “So you say you are only paying $145.20 for tax in the Regional district” gus if you are referring to my post I should clarify. The $145.20 per year is paid to the Pineview Improvement district as part of our water tax, paid once per year and then $13.20 p/m. My property taxes are paid to the Regional district.

“The road is plowed at least 6 times a winter and no more.”
So it is plowed EXACTLY six times? ;-)

oops … sorry …. looked kind of low .. thanks for setting it straight for me.