Woolwich Township staff has responded to last year’s budget request — namely, that each department do its best to find up to five per cent in cost-savings measures.
At the first budget session held on Jan. 12, councillors heard a variety of ideas from the CAO’s department, council and information services, fire and finance departments.
The CAO’s office will be forgoing the use of a labour negotiator for this year’s collective bargaining agreement, at a cost-savings of $10,000 over three years; will eliminate its membership in Grand River Country Tourism, saving $1,250, eliminate financial sponsorship for Taste Local! Taste Fresh! event, saving $3,000, and use train-the-trainer programs to reduce training costs, saving $2,000. The total planned savings is $16,250.
For council and information services, staff is proposing adding a $75 fee for property standards cases that require a third inspection visit, with an estimated revenue of $750; expand its marriage ceremony services, increasing revenue by $2,500; instituting a dog-tag campaign to get more owners to purchase dog tags, increasing revenue by $7,500; using bylaw enforcement staff to deliver council packages, saving up to $500 in courier fees; and changing enforcement staff hours to include more weekend hours, boosting parking ticket revenue by up to $2,500.
The department is also considering implementation of business licencing, administrative fees for parking tickets, charging a fee for wireless Internet access, and charging a fee for listing an event on the township’s website calendar of events.
The finance department is proposing implementing ebilling for township residents, reducing postage and paper costs, saving up to $4,300 per year, as well as introduce echecking, to save up to $500 per year.
For fire services, changes include reducing the amount of time spent on a fire or accident call by sending additional firefighters back to the station, and by requiring Waterloo Regional Police officers to direct traffic earlier than they do now.
Engineering and planning services is planning to introduce more fees for services, such as watermain and sewer inspections, and water shut-off inspections. New tender practices, such as tendering earlier in the season to obtain more “aggressive bidding” from contractors, could save up to $88,000.
The engineering department is also planning on charging its administrative and operations time related to the Elmira sidewalk snowclearing program to the program itself, saving the department $4,400 annually. The additional charge will be borne by Elmira ratepayers, who pay an additional levy for the snow-clearing service.
Recreation will be reducing staff availability in the fitness centre at the Woolwich Memorial Centre, relying on existing staff to conduct “spot checks” on the fitness centre throughout the day, at a cost savings of $41,187; reducing the staffing at the customer service desk at the WMC, at the pool, and reducing the hours of operation for the concession, as well as reducing the full-time and part-time arena maintenance staff at the WMC, and reduction in mileage amounts by requiring township staff use township vehicles during office hours.
The department also plans on changing prime-time ice hours, having them start at 5 p.m. instead of 6 p.m, and reducing part-time staff at the Woolwich Township arena in St. Jacobs.
The total estimated cost savings for these measures for the recreation department sit at approximately $177,000.
While township councillors approved the operating budgets for the CAO’s office, council and information services fire and finance at the Jan. 12 meeting, they have yet to consider engineering and planning and recreation.
In spite of these cost-saving measures, township staff is still proposing a 2.5 per cent tax levy increase for the coming year, with a separate 3 per cent infrastructure levy to help reduce the township’s infrastructure deficit.