There is something that seems a bit odd about a municipal government raising taxes just so they can put away around $900,000 for spending sometime down the road.
Clearly we are all missing something here, as the council in question — Athabasca County council — explained the tax hike was done to keep up with inflation.
Sorry, but if a municipality is maintaining its expenses without a jump in taxes and states it will be putting the new revenue into reserves, that isn’t “keeping up with inflation”; that is adding to people’s tax burden to pay for projects that are in the not-so-immediate future.
And at a time when the economy is facing uncertain times – due in part to low oil prices, a falling economy and both investors and business unsure of what a new NDP government will bring – maybe now isn’t the time to be taking money from people’s wallets to line the municipal reserve coffers for a set of unknown projects.
Yes, having reserves is an important and necessary part of the municipal budgeting process, but there is a time and a place to be adding money those reserves.
Regardless of the project, now is neither the time nor the place for grabbing more taxpayer dollars that are destined for future spending when the economy is suffering.
