THUNDER BAY — Days out from a final vote to approve the 2023 budget, Thunder Bay’s city council has heard feedback from a half-dozen local residents who sometimes pushed in opposite directions as they called for significant changes.
Council tentatively set the budget earlier this week, approving a 5.1 per cent tax levy increase (4.5 per cent after growth), a large police expansion, and cuts to staffing and services that still haven’t been defined.
Councillors will have one last opportunity to propose changes before the budget is ratified on Monday.
Thursday's deputations illustrated the competing priorities council must balance as it sets the budget, with some residents asking council to reverse planned service cuts, and others asking council to deepen those cuts.
Ray Smith, who held a pair of meetings for “concerned taxpayers” during the budget process, called the proposed tax hike “unacceptable” in the night’s first deputation.
“The exodus to rural areas will continue as Thunder Bay’s high taxes are chasing people away,” he said.
Smith argued council should make further cuts and dig deeper into its financial reserves to eliminate the tax hike entirely, which would require finding close to $10 million.
He suggested shrinking city management, castigating the previous council for approving pay increases of four to 12 per cent for management and other administrative staff.
The move will cost the city nearly $3 million a year by 2025, but leaders have called it necessary to stay competitive in a tight labour market.
“This group remains behind [compared to similar municipalities],” said city manager Norm Gale. “We’re not keeping up, and it’s one of the things that makes it difficult to recruit and retain professionals and leaders.”
Smith was one of two speakers to say Thunder Bay has the “second-highest taxes and tax rates” in Ontario on Thursday. Councillors asked Gale to address the claim.
While the city’s tax rate is indeed among the highest in the province, he said the taxes residents pay are not. He described the tax rate as a tool that allows cities with lower property values, like Thunder Bay, to offer services that are comparable to those where housing is more costly.
“It is wrong to say Thunder Bay has the second-highest taxes in Ontario,” he said. “The tax rate is an entirely different matter.”
“When you consider the average detached home, [Thunder Bay is] slightly below average in the comparator groups” in terms of actual taxes levied, he said.
Karen Rooney said her fears over how tax hikes will impact the most vulnerable, like low-income seniors and people with disabilities, inspired her to speak to council for the first time on Thursday.
The budget, as it stands, would result in a roughly $158 property tax increase for the owner of a median single family detached home with a $218,000 assessed value, according to estimates from city staff.
Rooney pointed to the over 500 municipal employees on the “sunshine list” that tracks public sector workers with salaries of over $100,000.
“That’s excessive,” she said. “I’m not saying they’re not good at their jobs … I’m just saying we can’t afford it.”
Asked to respond by council, Gale called the $100,000 threshold an “arbitrary number” that hadn’t changed since the list was first introduced in 1996.
“If the $100,000 was indexed to inflation — to $166,000 — the sunshine list for the City of Thunder Bay would be reduced by 90 per cent,” he said.
Gale said 83 per cent of city employees on the list work in emergency services, mostly police and fire, where the city has “scant control” over wages.
While calling for spending cuts, Rooney said those shouldn’t target the Thunder Bay Public Library, as several councillors have proposed.
“Local libraries are the hub for low-income seniors and those on disability,” she said. “They provide a place for social interaction, affordable reading, [and] an opportunity to access internet.”
Katrinna Scheibler-Smith objected to a $4 million increase in police spending included in the budget, the biggest factor in this year’s tax hike.
She shared what she described as harrowing encounters with Thunder Bay police, alleging she’d been handled with unnecessary physical force during a mental health call in which she posed no threat to public safety.
She called that consistent with how she witnessed officers treat the vulnerable, particularly Indigenous people, while working at a local homeless shelter.
“I ask you how, if we want to be a city devoted to reconciliation, sustainability, safety, and inclusion, you can justify continued investment and lack of accountability for the Thunder Bay Police Service,” she asked councillors.
She argued council should be shifting investments from police to social services, saying it would ultimately be more effective.
“For example, when a single parent is supported, uplifted, and encircled by community care such as libraries, food security programs, and child care … they’re far less likely to fall victim to human trafficking, gang activity, harmful addictions, and various other social ills and ailments.”
Jason Veltri, chair of the city’s anti-racism and equity committee and a runner-up in last year’s municipal election, told council the city must generally reduce spending, but asked it to reverse some cuts it approved on Tuesday.
He called a vote to approve significant service cuts without identifying where they’ll fall particularly egregious.
“You’re blindly telling administration to cut $500,000 worth of services without even understanding what could come,” he said. “That could have dramatic impacts on the services city residents rely on.”
Veltri urged council to boost investments in bike lanes, walkability, and public transit, echoing calls from dozens of residents at a budget meeting earlier this month.
Veltri also sought to restore summer bus service to Chippewa Park, which council cut after hearing the route averaged just two riders per hour.
“Not everybody has access to a vehicle,” Veltri said. “I believe no matter if it’s two people or 400, we owe it to the community and transit riders to have access to Chippewa in the summer.”
On the other hand, Veltri asked council to consider a cost-cutting option it didn’t touch Tuesday, cutting the number of supervised outdoor rinks from 11 to five to save around $150,000.
Andre Gagne suggested the city consider appointing an independent auditor general, saying it would provide a check on the city’s bureaucracy and support better decision-making.
“Make it easier for yourself by holding the city administration accountable for the information they provide,” he encouraged council.
Administration argued the city’s internal audit section already performs the same work, and pushed back on Gagne’s contention its staff are in a “conflict of interest” since they’re not independent, reporting administratively to the city manager’s office.
Gale said staff are held to strict professional standards and take direction in their work from the city’s audit committee, which includes councillors and citizen appointees.
“A few cities in Ontario do have auditor generals, but those cities are the minority,” he said. “The majority have an internal audit function just like [Thunder Bay], and there’s good reason for that … An auditor general is an expensive proposition, and the work [they do] is the same work being done by the internal [audit section].”
The section conducts risk audits, compliance audits, value-for-money audits, and reviews internal controls and procurement processes, said city treasurer Linda Evans.
Neither the Thunder Bay Chamber of Commerce, which pushed for a tax levy hike of just three per cent, nor city unions, whose members could be impacted by $700,000 in planned staffing cuts, offered feedback on Thursday.
