Duane Hicks
Residents and non-residents alike will have to pay a little more to use various community services here next year after town council approved a report Monday night to effect a one percent increase to most user fees in 2013.
Mayor Roy Avis said the Administration and Finance executive committee wanted to get the town’s user fees in order prior to the start of the new year.
“We looked at what the cost of living adjustment is for this year,” he noted.
“It runs just over one percent.”
The mayor added council knows it must increase user fees in order to keep up with costs coming in a little bit higher in the year ahead, and agreed on one percent.
“I think that’s very good. With the cost of living and everything where it is, staying within that range is very good,” said Mayor Avis.
He clarified the committee went over the user fee schedule line by line, and made minor adjustments up and down, with the overall increase averaging out to one percent.
The one percent hike is the smallest user fee adjustment in recent years. Most jumped three percent at the start of 2012.
They went up 1.7 percent in 2011, two percent in 2010, and three percent in 2009.
Mayor Avis said council realizes times are tough and doesn’t want to prevent the public from accessing local services.
“Council is very aware of the cost of families to use [the Memorial Sports Centre], and we don’t want to price it right out of the reach of common people in the community,” he stressed.
“We want to make sure people can enjoy the facility, but we still have to pay for it.”
The mayor noted that even with the one percent user fee hike, the Memorial Sports Centre still runs a deficit of roughly $450,000 a year that gets picked up by taxation.
He added the one percent increase also will apply to non-resident user fees.
But the one percent increase does not apply to sewer and water rates and a few other specific fees that will require individual discussion and evaluation.
These will be addressed later in the 2013 budget process.
