BOYLE – While the Village of Boyle remains awash in red ink due to a shortfall in revenue, the municipality has managed to shrink its operating deficit by more than $200,000 from 2021 to 2022, according to the recently-released financial statements.
At their April 5 meeting, village councillors voted 3-0, with mayor Colin Derko and Coun. Mike Antal absent, to accept the 25-page audited financial report prepared by Viney, Friesen, Stasiuk Chartered Accountants.
According to Kendra Stasiuk, who presented the report, while the village “didn’t have a great year operation wise,” it was an improvement over 2021.
"There’s a healthy cash balance, fully funded reserves, and an unrestricted surplus of $3.3 million, so I would say you’re still in a healthy financial position at this point,” she said.
Derko gave much of the credit for the village’s financial health to the previous councils, who he believed had been responsible spenders.
“I would like to take the credit for it, but I think it’s got a lot to do with the past councils, they’ve made a lot of good decisions over the years, and we get to flourish for it … I like where we’re sitting for sure.”
The “nuts and bolts”
First off, Stasiuk noted the village ended 2022 with a $464,556 deficit, before the capital income was considered.
The good news, according to Stasiuk, was that the number had gone down from the $674,852 it was in 2021.
And if you include capital income, that deficit shrinks even further to $151,700, but as their accountant pointed out, that money has already been spent, and can be deceiving to include.
Part of the deficit came from a revenue shortfall; the village was expecting to receive $4,033,268 in revenue in 2022 but ended up with $3,934,592, after getting less money than expected from the provincial government.
On the plus side, now that there has been a full year without COVID-19 restrictions, outstanding property taxes are also decreasing, with the biggest drop coming from the 2022 taxes.
“People are back to work, and getting their feet back under them, and they’re able to meet their obligations and pay their taxes,” said Stasiuk.
Property taxes in arrears decreased from $49,133 to $40,753, and taxes and grants in place of taxes shrunk to $77,871 from $94,980 94,980.
Boyle did accrue more debt this year and is currently sitting at $3,707,012 in long term debt, up from $3,352,466 in 2021. The village does still have $2,194,876 remaining on its debt limit and is currently scheduled to spend $396,523 in 2023 on repayment.
Despite the village sitting at over 50 per cent of its debt limit, Derko said that it hadn’t been a worry yet, and is in-line with his philosophy, as well as that of previous councils.
“With the interest rates, it was smart to borrow the money, and let today’s taxpayer pay for today’s privileges. With some municipalities, they don’t like to borrow money, and they go too far into reserves, and now you’ve got old money paying for new privileges. I don’t necessarily agree with that.”
On a final note, Stasiuk said the process of auditing the village’s finances was helped considerably by the municipality’s administrative staff.
“The books were in good order, the staff were open and accommodating, and provided everything we requested, which made our job so much easier,” said Stasiuk. “We weren’t looking specifically for fraud, but during our sample testing there were no indications to suspect that any fraud is occurring.”
