DRYDEN — Dryden’s mayor says the city’s 2026 financial roadmap is a “fairly ambitious budget.”
City council approved the municipal budget at its meeting on Monday. It will see a 2.82 per cent property tax levy increase over 2025 — that effectively means the municipality will to collect roughly $538,000 more through property taxes than it did last year.
Mayor Jack Harrison told Newswatch that infrastructure improvements are front-and-centre. The capital budget totals just under $21 million. Harrison said about $15 million of that is being covered by outside funding sources.
“We are focusing on infrastructure this year,” he said. “As most cities are encountering infrastructure renewal, we’re in the same boat.”
Operating expenditures are expected to be around $36 million for the year, giving a total budget of about $57 million.
Two larger capital projects include reconstructing a section of Duke Street — one of Dryden’s main thoroughfares and part of Highway 594 — and purchasing surplus land owned by the province at the south end of Van Horne Avenue at the waterfront for future development.
The $3.4 million worth of surface-level work on Duke Street between Casimir Avenue and Earl Avenue is being covered by external funding sources — Harrison said it’s through the province’s connecting links funding program. However, underground work on water mains and sewer infrastructure, totalling just under $2.1 million isn’t eligible, meaning those costs are coming out of dedicated municipal reserve funding and sewer and water rates.
The $300,000 earmarked for the Van Horne Avenue land purchase is for half of a 20-acre plot that Harrison said was used by the Ministry of Natural Resources in the 1970s as a water base, but now contains storage facilities. The province declared 10 acres of it surplus land, he said, which allows the city to purchase it.
The municipality is awaiting the opportunity to purchase the other half, Harrison added and that, along with another 10 acres the city already owns in the same area, is slated to be redeveloped, featuring housing and public-access amenities closer to the waterfront.
“There’s 30 acres there that we can put sewer and water into … for the growth of a subdivision down there,” he said. “That’s really important for our development of our city to increase our tax base and provide housing for those folks that we think will be coming to our community.”
Other line items include a total of $1.5 million for work to fix up the Sandy Beach Leisureplex, which the city now owns ($1.275 is projected to be covered by external funding) and $650,000 for the installation of pickleball courts nearby (most of that is also expected to be funded from non-municipal sources).
“We’re looking forward to doing a lot of work this year as well as (investing in) the maintenance of our city,” Harrison said.
The municipality received some good news when preparing the budget, as policing costs from the OPP are estimated to be down to $4.18 million in 2026 from $5.65 million the year prior.
“We had pretty heavy costs during the transition period, but that’s behind us now,” Harrison said. “The transition was pretty hard on our community, but that was the plan and we got through it, so we’re in a good spot now.”
Harrison said he’s pleased with what the budget is expected to achieve.
“Overall, I think it’s kind of a balance between maintaining our service levels, investing in our infrastructure, putting some money into reserves for the future, and then balancing out a modest tax increase for our citizens,” he said.
