No drop in traffic-fine cash

Jeremy Deutsch - Kamloops This Week Published: March 07, 2009

MLA says no need to worry about any shortfall The city can expect to get all of its traffic-fine revenue — that’s the guarantee from Kamloops-North Thompson MLA Kevin Krueger. The city’s financial department believed it was going to see a shortfall totalling $178,000 by next year in traffic-sharing revenue grants, after receiving a letter from the Ministry of Community Development advising of a change to the formula. But Krueger, who acknowledged the province was originally only going to commit 75 per cent of the traffic-fine revenue, said his Liberal government reversed its decision and will now give 100 per cent. “So [municipalities] will not get a nickel less than they would have got by the formula we’ve been using all along, over the next three years,” he said.“They’re just getting a whack of it right up front.”

Krueger, who is the minister of community development, explained there was more money in this year’s traffic-revenue budget than what’s projected during the next two years, so Victoria is giving the additional money to municipalities upfront. There will be three payments, one coming up at the end of March, one in July and one in July 2010. The first payment is expected to be around $1.2 million. The city gets roughly $1 million a year from traffic revenue, which goes right back into its policing budget. The amount each municipality gets from the larger pool of money is a ratio based on the amount each city spent on policing, compared to what is spent provincewide. The total pool of money the province has agreed to pay out by July 2010 is $232.4 million.But, unlike many things in recession, Krueger doesn’t expect overall traffic-fine revenue to decline during the next couple of years.

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Speeders add $1.3M to city coffers Darrell Bellaart, The Nanaimo Daily News

Nanaimo drivers broke more rules of the road in 2008 than they did in 2007, boosting the city's coffers in the process. Kevin Krueger, B.C. Minister of Community Development announced on Friday that Nanaimo will receive $1,311,150 as its share of traffic-fine revenue from last year. The province dished out $186 million province-wide, all of it from a pool of traffic fine revenues collected in 2008. It's an increase of $97,000 from last year, when Nanaimo got $1,213,991. Last year, the money was delivered in April, but Krueger said this year it was given out earlier to help stimulate the provincial economy. "Local governments told us they need help now," Krueger said. "We listened and we are taking action to assist local government to provide stability during these difficult times." Nanaimo MLA Leonard Krog questioned the earlier release of the funding in an election year. "The timing tells me that the government is afraid of losing the election and it is trying to use every opportunity to buy votes with taxpayers' money," Krog said. "This is cynical politics at its worst." Traffic ticket money must be spent on policing costs. Coun. Merv Unger, who sits on the Safer Nanaimo committee, said the province releasing the money a few months earlier won't make a major difference to the city budget. "I think it's more of a bookkeeping thing on government's behalf," Unger said. The province uses a formula to determine how much each municipality gets. "We provide the province with statistics annually on how much we spend on policing," said city finance director Brian Clemens. He said that to his understanding, the province compares the statistics with all other municipalities and works out each municipality's share of traffic fine revenue accordingly.

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Don Quixote Note: This appears to be an 8% increase for Nanaimo. If vernon got an eight percent increase in 2009 from the $580,000 received in 2008 then we would get an extra $46,400 for a total of $626,400. The budget is indicating revenue of $500,000 for 2009--- a $126,400 or 25% conservative underestimation.

In 2008 the fine revenue was estimated at $402,635 and actual was $580,656. Difference of $178,000 or 44% conservative underestimation.