By Cecilia Nasmith/Northumberland 89.7/Today’s Northumberland
In struggles to hold down the 2025 county-tax increase, Northumberland County council will take one more kick at the can – though Warden Brian Ostrander described the effort as “squeezing the lemon very hard.”
The discussion began at this week’s county council meeting with Director of Finance Matthew Nitsch’s report that projected budget figures have changed since his Nov. 5 report, and the change is upwards.
At that point, budget projections called for a 8.58% increase after growth. Since then, there have been almost $600,000 in additional costs for the new shelter at 310 Division St., Cobourg, and a proposal to support the Art Gallery of Northumberland to the tune of $100,000.
“We are now sitting at a 9.76% increase after growth,” Nitsch said.
Nitsch pointed out the further complication that the county has long added 1% to its base tax increase, these funds to be dedicated as infrastructure reserve. More recently, a second 1% was added as a new-housing reserve.
As council set out to review the budget, Nitsch warned that there are non-mandatory services and items that directly support mandatory programs.
“Things like IT and HR, that are not technically mandatory,” he added.
“And transportation infrastructure – technically, we don’t have to have a program to update our infrastructure, but we have maintenance standards we have to follow.”
Council recessed for more than an hour to come up with options, and passed a motion that calls for staff reports to come back in a number of key areas.
A freeze on council remuneration as well as salaries for the Chief Administrative Officer and other director-level positions
An examination of the Public Works department that focuses on roads operations (costings, staff deployments and so on)
The possibility of downloading bridge maintenance to lower tiers in certain circumstances (such as when the bridge is not on a county road)
Striving for a target increase of 6.5% without affecting funding for services to lower-tier municipalities (such as contributions to Cobourg for court costs)
A hiring freeze for positions deemed non-legislated or non-essential
The possibility of an organization review on upper- and lower-tier governments
Scott Jibb expressed doubt that the 6.5% target can be reached “without major impacts that we may or may not be willing to accept.”
Jibb described local families “sitting at their kitchen tables, trying to sort out whether they should pay the hydro bill or buy groceries.
“The objective here today is a different objective than, essentially, we have ever had before,” he declared.
