By Cecilia Nasmith/Today’s Northumberland
Between special funding opportunities and adjustments to operations over the COVID-19 pandemic, Northumberland County is expected to manage its finances just fine, Northumberland County council’s Finance and Audit Standing Committee heard at its May meeting.
“The main message here we would like to get across is, at this point, based on everything we know, we believe the additional COVID-19 funding we are going to be receiving will be sufficient to offset on-going pressures,” Deputy Treasurer Matt Nitsch stated.
Nitsch’s detailed report for the first quarter of 2021 contained news of what funding is available and how it is helping to make things safer, like the COVID-19 Resiliency Stream Funding that is retrofitting an entrance on the lower level of the Cobourg courthouse at 860 William St. so that people showing up to pay traffic tickets don’t have to enter through the front door and walk half the length of the upper level to get to the stairway to the lower level.
One pressure that has developed is the rising cost of construction materials such as wood and metal.
“Our largest project right now is the Golden Plough Lodge rebuild, and there are some risks there associated with price escalations,” Nitsch allowed.
On the other hand, there is the advantageous .6% interest rate currently available on the build from Infrastructure Ontario.
Treasurer Glenn Dees said that there are some reserves that had been set aside for the build. With the ability to invest them at a 0.95% interest rate, these will be brought in toward the end of the project in order to increase their impact.
Nitsch presented a list of impacts, including $19,000 for emergency child care for front-line workers and $231,000 for additional staffing and personal protective equipment for long-term care.
On the other hand, with no staff doing significant travel or undertaking significant training, there is a big savings on this item of about $83,000. This brings down to $1.7-million the total of negative impacts from the pandemic in the first quarter.
This compares favourably with $4.948-million available in COVID-19 funding for 2021 from such sources as $1.761-million in Safe Restart Funding and $2.365-million in Social Services Relief Funding.
The question from Chairman Bill Cane is, will that be enough to carry the county through. Staff expressed confidence that it will.
Chief Administrative Officer Jennifer Moore pointed out that a lot of the budget pressures relate to one-time or seasonal things, like the daytime and overnight warming rooms that were opened during the winter.
Nitsch estimates that the county still has $2.4-million in COVID-19 funding available for the next three quarters.
