Discussions

Winnipeg Sun March 7 2008  
 
If you want to see how committed Mayor Sam Katz is to finding savings at city hall to free up money for important things like street repair and bridge renewal, check out the rising costs in his own office.  
 
Katz told reporters yesterday the city is doing everything in its power to cut costs in order to avoid raising taxes.  
 
Well, if spending in Katz's office is an example of city hall's so-called frugality, we're in deep trouble.  
 
Katz is proposing a staggering 59% funding increase for the mayor's office, including a 50% increase in staff.  
 
In 2007, Katz had six full-time equivalent staff members in his office. This year he wants nine.  
 
That would mean permanent salary costs in his office would jump to $594,276 this year from $291,832 last year.  
 
That was the sound of your property taxes going up next year.  
 
Material and supplies in the mayor's office, including stationery and office supplies, are budgeted to rise $6,209 to $21,785.  
 
Office equipment jumps to $2,000 from $1,500, as does the annual office furniture allotment.  
 
Auto allowance in the mayor's office will rise to $2,500 from $2,000.  
 
And a new $10,645 "rentals" budget was added to Katz's spending envelope.  
 
All told, spending in the mayor's office will skyrocket to $825,645 in 2008, up from $519,603.  
 
Frugal? Not exactly.  
 
And it's hardly an example of Katz setting a tone of fiscal restraint for the rest of city hall.  
 
The bottom line with yesterday's budget is there were some cuts, including a $400,000 decrease to public art and some staffing reductions, although the city won't tell us where they are.  
 
But the cuts have been more than offset by spending increases, including discretionary ones like in Katz's office budget.  
 
For example, the budget includes $1 million of new spending for an "aboriginal youth strategy."  
 
What is the city doing setting up more social service programs when they can't even pave their own streets?  
 
They're also giving $50,000 to N'dinawe Youth Resource Centre, another new budget line.  
 
They gave increases to other social service agencies such as Rossbrook House and Andrew Street Family Centre.  
 
And they're still handing out $4 million in cultural grants.  
 
Trumpeted report  
 
The city has also failed to implement a single recommendation from last year's Economic Opportunities Commission as part of this year's budget, even though Katz trumpeted the report following its release as a constructive way to reduce costs at city hall.  
 
More talk, no action - and no balls.  
 
Overall spending in this year's operating budget is up 3.6%, well above inflation and higher than last year's 2.7% budget increase.  
 
That's not restraint.  
 
Restraint is when you freeze the mayor's office budget, say no to well-meaning but unaffordable expenditures like an aboriginal youth strategy program - which should, if anything, be funded by the province - and phase out grants to commercial operations like the Winnipeg Convention Centre.  
 
That's called tightening the purse strings.  
 
This budget opened the purse strings.  
 
Which is why Katz is already talking about raising property taxes next year.  
 
I had another look at Sam's "action plan" from the 2004 election and I didn't find anything about a hotel tax, which he proposed yesterday, raising property taxes or failing to cut the business tax.  
 
Not a word.  
 
He didn't promise taxpayers those things four years ago.  
 
I supposed if he did, he would never have been elected mayor.