Fernie City Council has passed its 2025 to 2029 five-year financial plan through first and second reading with an anticipated 7.46 per cent property tax increase.
The tax increase means an additional $212.03 on an average single-family home assessed at $925,235.
One major line item is the City’s new fire hall, which is budgeted for $1.6 million.
The total cost of Phase 1 of the fire hall replacement project is expected to be about $20.5 million.
City officials say they are looking for alternate funding sources, such as grants, regional partners or selling city-owned property, to keep Fernie and its taxpayers from bearing the brunt of the cost.
Fernie’s Fire Department has been operating out of a makeshift facility since 2022, and Mayor Nic Milligan says the replacement is long overdue.
“The Fire Hall started at its original location in 1979 and has since moved into a repurposed tire shop, it was a temporary location at the time,” said Milligan.
“We cannot be held to other people’s timelines in terms of the conversation and the needs of our community. We need to advance this regardless of how quickly they can come along.”
Milligan says the Regional District of East Kootenay is open to conversation about throwing its support behind the project.
“We have an active conversation and it is part of our planning, but it will not jeopardize building a fire hall in this community,” said Milligan.
“We have to meet the life safety needs of this community.”
Despite the high cost of the project, Milligan says putting off the new fire hall further will add more strain on the city’s budget.
“We know this from recent history, it’s not going to get any cheaper. We need to strike while the iron is hot and we can’t kick this down the road any further,” said Milligan.
“I don’t feel like that’s a responsible thing to do for this community.”
Council Member Ted Shoesmith feels tax increases may be challenging for residents and the city needs to do its part to save money where it can.
“When the tax rate consistently exceeded the rate of inflation, I think that should raise some eyebrows – it’s doing so for very good reasons, I might add,” said Shoesmith.
“We’re in a very inflationary environment and all of this just puts further pressure on the taxpayer. I think it behooves us to go above and beyond to make sure we’re not spending any money that don’t need to spend right now.”
Shoesmith says the city needs tax revenue to pay for much-needed projects and infrastructure.
“I know we have multiple projects that the town needs that are going to cost millions of dollars, and every dime we save right now should be going into reserves or taxpayers’ pockets,” said Shoesmith.
“We may not technically be in a recession, but a lot of people are feeling a lot of pain financially right now. As a city, we’re a tiny piece of that, but we are still part of it.”
The 2025 to 2029 five-year financial plan will be back for its third reading and adoption at a future meeting.
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