Richard Rolke - Vernon Morning Star Published: March 20, 2010 12:00 PM
The North Okanagan Regional District has ironed out a new budget despite some infighting. Adoption of the 2010 financial plan was pushed back from Wednesday to Thursday after some directors opposed expenditures for the fire training centre. “To try and throw this thing out at the last minute is inappropriate,” said director Mike Macnabb of the concerns from his colleagues. However, some middle ground to review the fire training function was found, allowing the budget to be approved before the March 31 deadline. The value of the regional district’s 2010 budget — including capital, operations and debt payment — is $83.0 million. Down slightly from $83.3 million last year. “We have clear direction going forward for this coming fiscal year,” said Herman Halvorson, chairman of the board. Among the big ticket items for 2010 are improvements to the Duteau Creek and Vance Creek water systems. Money from the budget is also going towards the victims assistance program and the Safe Communities Unit.
Each community is requisitioned based on the services it receives from NORD, and that varies. In fact, the budget impact can change from neighbourhood to neighbourhood depending on what services are in place such as street lights and recycling. “There really is no average impact,” said David Sewell, chief financial officer. “There is a wide range of differences depending on the jurisdiction and specified area you live in.”
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Don Quixote Note: at a posting of Feb 28 NORD Tax Requistions 2010 (Proposed) I had posted the effect on the average Coldstream and Vernon Taxpayer.
The first two charts in that posting are the proposed Nord Tax Requisitions for 2010 for Vernon and Coldstream. The net result is a 1% tax increase for Vernon taxpayers and a 2% Tax decrease for Coldstream.taxpayers.
Since there were no major changes since then I would expect this requistion to be the final result.
Naturally the Water Rates which are claimed to be 9% across the board but which are in reality a minimum of 10.65% to a possible 66.7% maximum, are NOT part of these numbers. Those increases are charged on a user basis rather than a tax basis.
2 comments:
As usual Rolke doesn't understand anything to do with taxation or financial matters-find him another job!
Richard Rolke has another job. He's a reporter, not an accountant. It's fairly typical for a reporter to not have more than a basic understanding of many of the subjects he reports on.
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