Are you sitting down?
"A British Columbia family of four could have saved on average $5,302 in municipal taxes..."
Canadian Federation of Independent Business,
Municipal Spending Watch 2013
Of 153 municipalities in British Columbia, only 10 managed to keep operating spending in line with inflation and population growth in the last decade.
That's 7 per cent of the municipalities in B.C.
Seven per cent.
Over the previous year, Vernon actually reduced its per capita spending by one per cent over the previous year, while Coldstream increased its by five per cent (page 15 of the link provided).
The 25-page report "Municipal Spending Watch 2013" is conducted annually by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business.
It begins:
A British
Columbia family of four could have saved on average $5,302 in municipal taxes
over the last 11 years if city councils kept their operating
spending to the rate of inflation and population growth. While operating spending grew at a slower
pace than previous years, total real municipal operating spending has increased
by 52 per cent from 2000 to 2011, representing $5.4 billion in EXCESS spending far
beyond what should be considered as sustainable and fiscally responsible.
As reported in today's The Province by Susan Lazaruk, the CFIB is recommending that municipalities:
- Limit spending hikes to the rate of population growth and inflation.
- Identify "core services" and review them to ensure they're being effectively managed.
- Freeze public sector wages to close the 35 per cent wage gap with the private sector, and,
- Increase the transparency of how financial data is reported.
Probably feeling a bit smug that they're not the worst offenders (Vancouver Island...at 46% spending).
But they're far from the best too.
Look at Kaslo in the Kootenays. Their population grew 13 per cent in the last decade, yet they've been awarded the Most Sustainable Municipality distinction. Why? Because they cut back on municipal operating spending per capita by 11 per cent last year alone...in the 11 years of the spending watch report, Kaslo has reduced real operating spending per capita by 9 per cent. In 11 years!
Congratulations Kaslo...no wonder numerous small businesses have opted to move to Kaslo.
They're not getting gouged with taxes in Kaslo.
Back to core services.
You know...that KPMG core services review that Vernon's politicians read when it arrived, and put on the shelf without determining if Vernon's services were effectively managed.
Makes one wonder why the hell a core services review was done.
More than one letter from a resident chastized City Hall for not releasing the results of the review to the public...you know, the people who paid for it!
As to transparency of financial data, have any of our communities' citizens ever struggled through a Financial Statement for Coldstream or Vernon to learn how much debt each community has?
Few of us are accountants, and GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles) allow sufficient "fuzziness" to make the statements read like Greek to most of us. Everything balances. How nice. Any idea how many millions of dollars Coldstream and Vernon are in debt? Nope.
"There's a GAP all right," asserts Kia.
