“We are at a very unacceptable situation right now.  Our residents aren’t going to accept where we sit right now.”

Timmins Mayor Steve Black isn’t too thrilled over where the city sits in terms of an expenditure budget increase.

That sits between 6-8% at the moment and the 2017 budget looks far from being passed here in early February.  As it stands, the overall tax rate increase is around 4.49%.

And it’s not like they didn’t see it coming either, after piling around $15-million dollars in expenditures on a “wish list” of things councillors would want.

There are some items on the books right now, like the $1-million dollars to put into the Aquatic Centre reserve…and those like the $500,000 Hollinger grandstand refurbishment project that isn’t.

There’s also…well, see for yourself. (CLICK HERE)

The one thing that didn’t go unnoticed was Councillor Rick Dubeau’s request to look into cutting 2% out of each department’s overall budget.

Dubeau argues that when the vote was passed, staff had an obligation to make it happen and expressed his disappointment that they didn’t.

With seemingly no budging at this stage on some expenditure items, Councillor Noella Rinaldo says they’ll have to cut services if they really want that decrease.

Dubeau went straight to the Golden Manor debate, making comparisons to Casselhome in North Bay.

He is continuing his rhetoric of urging council to at least take a look into the matter.

And with every Golden Manor debate, the senior member of council had a passionate plea to go along with.

Councillor Mike Doody retorts that Casselhome looked into going for-proft, but the Board of Management didn’t want to go that route because those wanting to make the change wanted the city to write out a $50-million dollar cheque.

“It’s great to know that we have a councillor sitting at our table that wants to take a look at saving money, and wants to do it on the back of our seniors in our community,” Doody said with a slight edge to his tone towards Dubeau.

Doody acknowledges that many people are on the side of Dubeau in terms of making cuts but continued to vigorously defend the current Manor model.

“He has his views, I have my views,” he added, “I’ll step forward and fight for our seniors and want them to get the best (service and care).”

Council agreed to look at the “wish list” items not on the budget next Wednesday, at another budget meeting.

CLICK HERE to view the full presentation, under Item 2D.  The discussion is about an hour and 42 minutes long.

Filed under: Local News