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Tiny approves 1% blended tax increase for 2021

The tax-rate breakdown indicates a 2.42% municipal hike and zero per cent tax rate increases for the county and education sections
2020-03-09-Tiny-Township
Tiny Township municipal office is currently located on Balm Beach Road. Mehreen Shahid/MidlandToday

The last of the four North Simcoe municipalities finalized its tax rate Friday.

Tiny Township council voted in favour of a budget that presented a 1% blended (municipal, county, and education) tax rate. The municipal tax hike for 2021 is at 2.42%, whereas the county and education taxes have been held at zero per cent. 

The net operating budget for Tiny sits at $11,265,968, a $457,368 increase from last year. The net capital projects budget sits at $1,630,615. The gross capital budget was calculated at $5,852,666, but a major part of it was covered with the help of grants and reserve funds.

Some changes attributing to the increase in the net operating budget came from corporate insurance premium increase of 21%, a new human resources staff position for the remainder of 2021, and 1% cost of living increase for wages and benefits, the council part of which was added to a student bursary program.

Tiny's various reserves continue to look healthy, with an increase in reserves, reserve funds and obligatory reserve funds estimated to be $693,099 or a 6.9% increase from 2020. Another $900,000 from surplus land sales has replenished the parkland and capital reserves. Policing costs are scheduled to decrease by 1.2% from 2020 based on the estimate received from the Municipal Policing Bureau. There were also reductions in public administration and fleet maintenance budgets.

Some capital expenditures include: Replacement of a tanker truck in the fire department at $223,413, installation of two more parking machines at a cost of $21,000, signage and road improvements along with some parks projects.

Councillors unanimously voted for the new tax rate and also indicated that staff should take another look at the budget process for 2022.

"We had identified a couple of opportunities for the 2022 budget deliberations," said Coun. Tony Mintoff. "One was that council agreed that for the next budget prep, council would provide staff direction prior to the draft budget. I would like to emulate what Midland council has done where they request presentations from all boards, committees and organizations."

The township's newly inaugurated chief administrative officer said he would be happy to take a look at how the process can be changed.

"I would like the opportunity to review the process of how the budget is put together here and what the timelines are," said Robert Lamb. "I think there might be some steps we should be looking at doing so that council plays a role earlier. We could either have a separate motion or have deeper discussion with my senior management and bring forward a suggestion to council about the 2022 procedure."


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Mehreen Shahid

About the Author: Mehreen Shahid

Mehreen Shahid covers municipal issues in Cambridge
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