By: Laura Steiner
The Town of Milton is into its 2018 budget process. The “Budget Call” report went out in July. The budget is available on the Town’s website. Council’s Committee of the Whole will be meeting Monday December 4, and Tuesday December 5 to discuss it. Here are a few things to keep in mind.
1.Where do my tax dollars go? Out of every dollar:
20 cents goes to Fire & Protective Services, 16 cents to capital project financing, 12 cents to Recreation facilities. 9 cents goes to Park maintainence. Another 9 cents goes to Road Maintainence, 8 cents to Transit, 7 cents to Milton Public Library, 7 cents to winter maintainence, 5 cents to Civic, 4 cents to Administration, Zoning, and Economic Development, 2 cents to streetlights, and 1 cent to the hospital. The Region of Halton and Halton District School Board each come up with their own budgets
2. How much will my taxes go up?
Town staff have prepared a range of options between 4-7.50%. This could possibly impact property taxes $18.14/ $100,000. The town of Milton has one of the lowest tax levels in the Greater Toronto area.
3. What’s the difference between the Capital and Operating Budget?
The Capital budget looks at how items like roads, facilities like the Sports Centre, and Sherwood Community Centre, and transit. The Operating budget looks at how much it is to operate the Town.
4. What kinds of decisions do Councillors have to make?
The third part of the budget deals with decision packages. A table describing each program, the proposed change, its impact, whether it will increase/decrease the service level, the overall service cost, the impact per $100,000 on a tax bill, and a tax impact.
This year Councillors are looking at 15 programs. Changes could include the cancellation of Saturday transit service, shutting the library on Sundays in May/ June. And a deferral of transit growth by pushing service through Boyne, and out to Derry Green into 2019.
5. How do I participate?
You can register with the Town Clerk’s office by filling out a delegation request form on their website. Or watching the proceedings live via webcast.
What to Watch out for…
a) Infrastructure deficit: The Town of Milton is running an annual deficit of $33.2 million. There’s a proposal to establish an infrastructure reserve of $.1 million
b) Transit as a contentious issue: The pilot project for route 62 is supposed to end at the end of 2017. Ward 3 Councillor Cindy Lunau proposed to continue it should the funds in the budget be found.
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