At the regular meeting of Barrhead County council on Tuesday, Dec. 15, council approved their 2016 interim budgets.
“It doesn’t look like the situation Diane Begert, director of finance and adminstration for the county, presented us with at our last meeting has changed,” County Reeve Bill Lee said, referencing a linear fluke, adding council had expected as much.
“We won’t know what that is going to turn out to be until the end of January or early February,” Mark Oberg, the county’s manager, said, adding that it is the province that makes the municipality’s linear assessment and that that is where a projected shortage is expected to come from.
Although all of the budgets were passed unanimously, several councillors took issue with the language of a specific aspect of the Barrhead Public Library board’s operating budget.
“The contribution to the library board from the county is $5,560 and that represents 50 per cent of the proposed cost of utilities for the Barrhead library facility,” Lee said, adding that he was unclear on who paid the other 50 per cent.
“In the contract with Pembina Hills, it says that particular 50 per cent is shared. They share half and the other portion is split between the town and county. Our costs should only be 25 per cent.”
According to Lee, the town and county each contribute $5,560 towards janitorial services and supplies, water, sewage, heat and power, for a grand total of $11,120.
“Where is Pembina Hills in there? Where’s the school? They are supposed to be handling half of that cost, and we’re supposed to be sharing the other 50 per cent with the town, by contract,” he said.
“I didn’t realize that the cost of utilities combined with janitorial fees was that much,” Deputy Reeve Doug Drozd said, adding he did not think it was that high to begin with.
“It’s set by the school board,” Coun. Darrell Troock said, adding he believed the numbers were the same as last years.
“My question is why we are paying the whole shot though,” Lee said.
“We will be checking into the contract to see if everything is being done correctly or not, and if not, we’ll do a budget adjustment,” Oberg said, adding the shared cost for utilities at the library’s facility would remain at 2015 rates for the council.
The problem, Lee said, is council already had the numbers from before and the ones proposed now are not the same.
“If the total cost is $11,120 for both the town and the county combined, there should be a breakdown of what the 50 per cent consists of,” Lee said, stressing he believed the county should only be paying 25 per cent.
Coun. Dennis Nanninga explained the county is already paying half of the shared cost of utilities as described in the contract.
“Half of the total cost is $5,600 and that’s what we’re contributing,” Nanninga added.
“The breakdown provided for the operating budget of the Barrhead Library for the year 2016 includes $364,509 in operating expenditures, and a contribution from the County of Barrhead for $99,670,” Troock said, reading from supporting information provided to council. “This is made up from $17.35 per capital, of which $30,709 is forwarded to the Neerlandia Public Library operations by the library board and an additional contribution from the county.”
“Our contribution is in that $99,670 and it is not in addition to it,” Troock added.
Lee however, was still concerned. “We’ve been there before though, how can the utilities be that high?” he asked.
Coun. Marvin Schatz, incidentally, did not think it was a big deal.
“It’s not even $1,000 a month for utilities and janitorial fees,” he said, adding that he felt it was not really all that high at all.
“We should get some clarification that the written word agrees with the numbers however,” Nanninga said.
“It is a lot and I agree,” Troock said, adding the library board has concerns about the same things council did. “We’re fighting the school board on this though and whatever they say, you either go with them or you get out. They’ve never been good at negotiating.”
According to Lee, council has been working on arranging a meeting with the library board for quite some time now and are looking at a date in the new year.
“When we find out what the contract is, we will have a really good look at it,” Lee said.
Council motioned to accept the library board’s interim operating budget on that basis and moved on to other matters.
