Tuesday, January 09, 2007

Mayor and Council salaries should have budget increases cut in half !

Bank of Canada Inflation Calculator

The above link indicates that the inflation rate (CPI) at end of November on an annualized basis is 1.4%.

The financial parameters that were to be used by staff for the 2007 budget was to use a cost of living index of 3.0%. This rate was to be used for the salary adjustments for the Mayor and Council as per the City's policy of annually adjusting their renumeration.

This percentage that is being used in the above example and in other parts of the city's renumeration policies as well as for materials and supplies is a general allowance used if better information is not available.

This 1.5% cushion that is already built into the budget should be more than adequate to make the 1% departmental cuts that the council is requesting from the staff.

City Departments Asked to Reduce Spending http://www.1075kiss.com/news/headlines/
One member of Vernon council is concerned a demand for city spending cuts, will only cause problems. Staff in each city department will be asked to reduce spending by one percent to allow certainprojects to proceed, and to keep this year's tax hike under three percent. Councillor Jack Gilroy, a former long time Vernon firefighter, disagrees with the move,'It'll be1% this year is it 2% next year? Like in the fire department budget where do you find 1%? Cut training? Because the fire department budget is almost all wages and there's other departments inthe city that are just like that too. It isn't just you can run in there and you can find 1%. Mayor Wayne Lippert says asking its managers to find savings without losing any services, is good business practice, on the part of the city.(Pete McIntyre)

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Who came up with the idea of a percentage cut-I bet that it was Beardsell