By a 12-6 vote, Chatham-Kent council last Thursday approved a nearly $290 million budget that includes a 1.99 per cent residential property tax increase.
With an increase once as high as 3.44 per cent, council decreased the impact on the tax roll by funding items from various reserve accounts.
A total of $2.84 million was taken from the Ontario Works reserve to fund commitments to refurbishing Ridgetown College and completing the Chatham-Kent Hospice.
A further $1.25 million was cut from the building, licensing and enforcement reserve and $137,500 was taken from the active and healthy communities reserve for a sports field in Wallaceburg.
As well, $50,000 was taken from general reserves to hire a fundraiser for the proposed new animal shelter.
Chatham Mazda from Chatham Voice on Vimeo.
Council hired, then unhired, then hired a new fire inspector at a cost of just under $130,000 annually
Among items denied were a $75,000 request to upgrade an athletic field in Ridgetown.
Council chopped $77,000 for Communities in Bloom funding and eliminated its agricultural business office at the Ridgetown Campus.
The 1.99 per cent increase works out to approximately $53 on a home assessed at $161,000. That “average” home will now pay $2,733 in municipal property taxes.
Voting in favour were Mayor Hope and councillors Mark Authier, Darrin Canniff, Bryon Fluker, Karen Herman, Brock McGregor, Carmen McGregor, Bob Myers, Derek Robertson, Trevor Thompson, Frank Vercouteren and Jeff Wesley.
Voting against were councillors Michael Bondy, Joe Faas, Leon Leclair, Doug Sulman, Steve Pinsonneault and David VanDamme.
