Chris Mayne, the chair of the North Bay-Mattawa Conservation Authority, says he understands that in today’s climate the provincial government is being careful with taxpayers’ money and it’s why the local agency had some of its budget reduced.
However, Mayne is surprised that the Ford government targeted the NBMCA’s flood prevention and flood mitigation program and cut its funding by half when it reduced the budget by $125,000.
Mayne is also surprised by the timing.
“The funding was withdrawn right at the time of year where programs we consider to be very important were significantly cut back,” he said.
Mayne says the dollar amount and area of programming did take the NBMCA back a little and he adds a little more notice would have been nice.
Mayne says the NBMCA had a sense that some cuts were coming when not all of its programs were approved in mid-February.
Mayne points out the funding in the flood mitigation program is dedicated money the NBMCA receives from the province.
Other programs under the NBMCA also receive dedicated funding meaning money cannot be transferred from one department or area to another.
But Mayne says not all the funding is restricted and he feels confident the board will be able to move money around to help make up the shortfall.
Mayne says the one thing the board won’t do is ask the NBMCA’s member municipalities for more money to offset the $125,000 cut.
“No one is in a hurry to go back to the municipalities and levy again once we’ve already passed on our budget for the year,” he said.
“There’s a strong sense the member municipalities are already under budget pressures from other directions. No one is in a frame of mind that we want to pass the new costs onto the municipalities. Effectively, it would just be a download from the province to the municipalities.”
Mayne said the NBMCA will survive the reduced budget by tightening up programs and reducing expenditures in other areas.
He says the NBMCA’s total budget is $3.8 million and believes the savings can be found.
The board chair adds he doesn’t expect any jobs to be affected but the budget reduction.
Mayne says while the NBMCA did not expect to be consulted specifically before the cuts were made, he thought there might have been talks with the conservation authorities across the province in general before the cuts were decided, however that didn’t happen.
Mayne says while the NBMCA should be able to survive this year’s cut, it may face more challenges in December, January and February as it prepares the 2020-21 budget.
“We’re going to have a lower amount to start with,” Mayne said.
“That’s when the harder choices will be made.”
Mayne says in a worst case scenario if the NBMCA hit a wall with the cutbacks, the NBMCA “could always go back to the province and ask for reconsideration”.
Mayne says one area that does concern him because of the reduced funding is does the NBMCA become open to more liability because it no longer carries out flood monitoring, reporting and prevention measures as completely as it once did?
Mayne says in theory that could make a difference in what the NBMCA’s future insurance costs could be.