A slight tax increase?

[cowman]

My local municipality has heroically struggled with costs and wrestled the budget down to around $22 million! Of course this will result in a "slight tax increase" of around 2.5% with the added message " might be higher due to increased assesssment"!
Now this is all fine and dandy, except for one thing...the oil and gas revenue in this county is literally exploding off the map! You would not believe the drilling going on in the southeast part of this county. When you see the map of proposed wells for the coming year, it looks like someone took a pepper shaker and sprinkled that area with dots!
Now I know, or have a pretty good understanding, of the amount of money the county makes off an oil lease and it is substantial to say the least(close or better than what the landowner gets in rent)! So where is all this money going?
Well it is true the municipality has a fairly ambitious road program for the coming year, but the real kicker is "operating expenses" which are close to $16 million! Hmmm, I wonder why? The county "privatized" many services a few years ago, and I believe that was a good thing, however they did not continue with their plans and left things like assessment, planning, accounting, agriculture, intact. These departments have grown very rapidly until they have quite a few more employees than used to work for the whole county before privatization! In other words we now have more paper pushers than ever before, and like any beuracracy thay tend to grow and grow?
I wonder how long it will take until the ratepayers of this county get fed up with paying through the nose for a bunch of dead weight?

[cakadu]

The tax increase will be held to 2.5%, depending on what the education levy comes out at - whenever they set that. The county staff was also given a 3% raise at the last council meeting.

I believe that the reason for the growth in the staffing at the county was, in part, to be prepared for the continued rise in development that will be taking place in the county over the next few years. Sometimes you have to anticipate the growth instead of being overwhelmed by it and forced to hire people in order to fill positions. (Maybe emrald can shed a bit more light on this one).

I think what is more important than the question of staff is having staff be accountable for their actions. From what I can tell at present, there is no real accountability to Council for what staff does, which should have been an absolute after the last fiasco where someone absconded with a bunch of money.

Council, like any other Board, should not be involved in the day to day running of the county, but should set policy and be kept fully informed about what is going on. The onus is on a board to hire the best people that they can to run things and then they have to take a step back and let the people do their jobs and not be micro-managed.

I don't know how easy that is with municipalities and other government bodies where public money is at stake. I would think that the duty of care would be a lot higher with public money.

[cakadu]

The CAO or County Manager should be the person where the buck stops regarding ensuring that all staff carry out the duties associated with their job description. All department heads within a municipality answer to the CAO or municipal manager whatever title is applicable.
As far as ag services, planning services etc. go. Each rural municipality is required to have an Agricultural Fieldman and Agricultural Service Board. That Board sets agricultlral related policy and is responsible for ensuring that staff carry out their duties and responsibilities with respect to the Agricultural Service Board Act, the Weeds and Pests Act etc. It isn't as simple as privitizing this service. As far as sourcing out planning and development areas of the municipality, I would suggest that the cost would likely double compared to having those facilities in house.
I have always found that a good Development Officer is worth their salary in the added assessment they bring in by encouraging orderly development. Having staff persons in that role, seems to me to be a much better service to the citizens than having contract persons who may or may not live anywhere near the county.
Very few municipalities source out their development officer position, however, some do use contract planning services.

[cowman]

I believe all of these services were to be privatized in stages, but somewhere along the line things stopped. Mostly privatization took place for one reason: the council needed a diversion from the "Mearns affair", which was when the CAO ripped off the county for $3 million and it became very apparent that no one was minding the store!
Still the county claims "phase one" of the privatization saved immense amounts of money and phase 2,3, and 4 would save even more. Unfortunately there was no phase 2,3 and 4!
The idea of privatization of the Ag Services would not eliminate the Ag fieldman job or the Ag Service Board. All it was supposed to do was contract out the weed and pest control programs. The actual costs, to the county, would have been greatly reduced with a better or equal
service. I am a firm believer in letting the private sector step in and contract out what have become overly expensive public jobs. Eliminates a lot of waste and capital expense? Red Deer County claims they saved $2 million by contracting out public works and field services...should work as well in the other areas?...Before they ended their privitization plans they were claiming it would save even more!

[cowman]

you and I will have to agree to disagree on the privatization issue with respect to municipal services.
In my years as a municipal official we tried privatization of some grader beats as well as beaver control etc.
We found that the private grading contractor didn't want to wear out blades so the county supplied them. It cost us an average of 35% more to do the same amount of road with the contract grader than with county owned equipment and staff. This test was done over a year and a half and not only did it cost more but the public wasn't happy with the service.
The county had a beaver control officer who trapped beaver where they were causing a problem to county infrastructure. He worked at other jobs as well, including driving the mowing tractor, putting out signs etc. His position was eliminated and a contractor brought in. The contractor only trapped beaver and the cost was more than one and a half times as much as the permanent staff position with benefits !
The Private sector is in business to make money, municipaities aren't. It is not the responsibility of municipal councils to create work for private contractors if the cost is significantly more than doing the same work in house.
Our Ag Dept. used to tender out all spraying. We always used the lowest tender, and on more than one occaision we found that the work was not reliable. We costed out purchasing a spray truck and hiring a summer position spray technician. This plus the cost of the product which we had to buy for the contractor in any case, was significantly less. The spray truck was a dual purpose vehicle as the sander was put on it in the winter.
We had numerous people directing council to privatize everything, sell all the county equipment and contract out all but the office staff, however, when the bottom line was available to the public they became a lot less adamant that we contract.
Our municipality has recently investigated the possibility of contracting private garbage pick up vs. keeping transfer stations open. The cost to contract was prohibitive, and would cost a lot more than keeping the transfer stations open, having one person at each station during operating hours and contracting the garbage removal to the local contractor.
In municipal governance, the bottom line has got to be the most cost effective way of doing business. In our case, and in many others, privatization is not .

[cakadu]

Cowman, where we got hurt with the privatization of the road grading services is in the day-to-day upkeep of the roads. That was probably the number one issue for many residents out my way and I'm sure in your area it is no different.

I would say that with the privatization of the road work it has gotten a lot slower than what it used to be, or at least that is the way it seems to me at any rate.

I don't recall them talking about privatizing the ag fieldman etc. and I've been on the Ag Service Board for the past 2 years. I also have to agree with emrald with respect to privatizing some of the other services. I would presume that is why they have increased the staffing in the land development area as an example, so they wouldn't have to contract it out. From what I understand from people, however, is that they are not at all impressed by the level of service provided by the County staff. I myself haven't had any problems, but then I haven't been in there looking for development permits etc. either. Some people have come away from the county office pretty steamed and I'm not sure what is being done to address the issues.

The county may have saved some money by contracting out some services, but it seems to me that they have also paid out more for other things as well, so I would suspect it all evens out in the end.

[cakadu]

Linda, sometimes people come away steaming from a county office because they don't like the rules not the service !!! The main business a rural municipality is in is the ROAD business, when maintenance of rural roads isn't considered adequate by residents, then usually the council has a pretty rough ride, particularily if they are believed to be spending tax dollars on other things that aren't necessarily the priority for their citizens.

[cowman]

Linda: They never talked about privatizing the fieldman position. The fact is most of the fieldmans salary is paid for by the Alberta government through a grant. The spraying and pest control was definitely on the table(and that was a decision by County council). In fact beaver control is contracted out.
In Red Deer county road grading and plowing has always been contracted out. The county only had two graders, pre-privatization, and that was for one areas where most contracters wouldn't go and the other one for road work.
I do find it strange that Red Deer county has had such a positive experience with privatization while other counties have not? And yet ask any councillor and they can quote you exactly how many millions we've saved. You don't think they are lying or have cooked the books, do you?
I think why a lot of people are not happy campers when they go to development is the fact Red Deer county not only charges quite a bit more than any other local county, but by the attitude of the so-called planners? And the attitude of the beuracracy that they make the rules and interpret them however they like? I believe they need to remember who pays their salary and who owns the land in this county?
The one thing going for us is we have a fairly sensible Reeve right now, who understands the need for development and just how dead end agriculture is becoming.

[cakadu]

Agriculture as it has been known up to this point is facing some major changes or it will wither on the vine. Understanding the need and allowing for development is one thing, doing it in a manner that benefits the county as a whole, does little or no harm to the environment, spends tax dollars wisely and looks long term is another story entirely. I'm not sure how easy a task this is going to be planning wise when the reports and studies the county has commissioned up to this point are at odds with one another - at least where land use and preserving agricultural land are concerned.

The councillors are expected to be able to put their own personal views and agendas to the side and do what is best for all residents of the county, which entails listening to county residents.

[cakadu]

Excellent points Linda. Cowman, the Ag Fieldmans salary is not paid in part by the Provincial Agricultural Service Board grant. In order to receive an ASB Grant, municipalities must administer several agricultural related pieces of legislation. The grant monies are intended to assist in offsetting the cost of doing the above, not to pay the Ag Fieldman. The ASB funding is based on a formula so not all municipalities receive the same amount in the way of their grant. Weed control, pest control are two areas that the ASB grant will assist in developing and administering programs. These are not all necessarily done by the Fieldman. All fieldmen are weed inspectors but not many of them actually do weed inspections. They run the department and oversee the staff as well as develop programs at the direction of the Ag Service Board.
Planning and Development is a never ending process in a municipality that is experiencing the growth that your county is. Preservation of agricultural lands is a challenge when it has to compete with development but if the agricultural community is noisy enough they can get the attention of their council.
In my area the Development Officer is totally in the dark when it comes to agriculture or agricultural legislation, so the local ag community has to keep on top of all proposed development in the ag zoned areas of the county. I am of the understanding that our land use by-law is going to be revisited yet again !! The last council amended it to allow up to 5 parcels out of ag land anywhere in the county. The council previous to that had implemented an Ag A and Ag B district. The Ag A district was good productive land and only one parcel was allowed per quarter. The Ag B district was around hamlets, towns, villages etc. as well as multi parcel country residential areas where up to three parcels were allowed out and for the most part they were required to hook up to municipal services to avoid multi private sewage disposal sites on small parcels.
I think that the new council will likely tend to revert to the old zoning and allow one parcel out on better ag land.

[cowman]

Linda: I will point out to you that the conflicting land use studies were not really the same. The Reeves task force involved the people...the other study was a paid consultant, who did not consult the people? In fact I would go so far to bet that he was basically told by the planning department what results they wanted and then was told to go out and get them? Maybe not?
The point here is the people spoke pretty clearly on where they wanted to go? Even the hand picked Agricultural panel said very clearly, keep "First Parcel Out"? Now the planning department, in all their professional wisdom, aren't about to let the peasants decide important things like that...so we have a conflict! Who will decide...the people or the elite? I guess we'll soon find out if democracy is alive and well in Red Deer county or is just a myth? Perhaps we need a plebisite?...but then that wouldn't get the desired result, now would it?
Emerald: I suspect your municipality will have a tough time getting that genie back in the bottle? As they should?
Now I have no clue what land prices are where you live but if it was like here you could expect bare farm land to sell in that $2,000-$2,800/acre. A three acre bare subdivision could be anywhere from $40,000 to $120,000! So taking your 5 lot example a farmer could be sitting on land worth quite a bit of money! Example: 5 lots worth $60,000=$300,000 plus the remaining 145 acres at $2200= $319,000 for a grand total of $619,000! Compare that to 160 acres at $2200=$352,000! For a difference of $267,000!
Now do you think that farmer is going to gladly give up $267,000 so some one can have a fantasy they are actually making a living raising some worthless cows or raising some $1.85 barley?
In Red Deer County we are not fighting for the right to have 5 subdivisions per quarter...just one! We would be in heaven if they ever let us have 5!
How any landowner would be willing to see his assetts devalued by half is more than I can understand. Do they think they will be farming forever?

[cowman]

Cowman, land in this area sells for around $1000 an acre for farm land. The problem is that we are not a grain growing area, our main agriculture is cattle, cow/calf to be specific. Allowing ad hoc subdivision of farm land, and scattering country residential parcels around the area makes for many conflicts due to a complete lack of understanding of generally accepted farming practices .
If a farmer has to start selling of small parcels in order to continue farming then it may be in his best interest to sell his entire operation to someone who really wants to farm. In our area the legitimate farmers are asking for a change to the land use by-law, to only allow a first parcel out and as well as fragmented parcels that are separated from the quarter by a road, highway, creek etc.
I have only heard of one farmer that lives ten miles from town that wants to be allowed to take three subdivisions out of their land, and they are having severe financial problems .

[Horse]

Emerald1 I hope you dont mind my asking but what county do you live and are you a civil servant, Not trying to be nosey but sometimes I do wonder where you are coming from.
In case you are wondering about me I have done nothing but farm for the past 34 yr I moved from Red Deer then to barrhead then and took full time farming. I guess I fibed I have took a job for a day or two now and then for whiskey money.

[Horse]

Horse, hopefully my comments aren't so outlandish that you think I must be a civil servant !! Kidding !!!
I am not a civil servant but have been an elected official in the past. I keep myself current regarding land use issues, and legislation that affects agriculture and municipalities. I won't name the county where I reside in order to protect the INNOCENT !!! My views are my own, not those of any particular group or municipality. Hopefully, my views reflect some of the common sense I have acquired along the way in life.
I have never worked for Whiskey Money, but I will admit that there have been times during my 30 years in the cattle business that I have almost been driven to drink the stuff !!!! I am currently involved in other pursuits that keep me in close touch with the livestock sector.

[cakadu]

The Ag Viability Study took a look at what was out there in terms of agricultural enterprises that existed throughout the county. From that study recommendations were made regarding what should happen with agriculture in the future. The process of how the results were achieved in the 2 studies may have been different, but what is most important is the outcomes of the two studies which are at odds with one another.

I would bet, cowman, that the planning department will carry out the policies that are set by the Council. How they are interpreted and how much accountability from that department will be remain to be seen, however.

I wonder if the 4/3 split with respect to the first parcel out issue will continue to hold now that we have new councillors on board, 2 of which are brand new to this whole arena?

I question why a big bunch of money needs to be spent to expand the parking lot at the County offices so soon after it was built.

Emrald, I have to say that you are on the money with respect to selling off bits of land in order to keep farming. What are your thoughts regarding the sale of land down on the eastern slopes a year or so ago that was done for the reason you stated - he sold off the acreage so that he could have enough money to continue farming. It didn't matter that it was interrupting wildlife corridors and leaving other footprints.

More and more it is looking like the Natural Capital aspect will have to be brought into play when making some of these land use decisions.

Cowman, your statements regarding the amount of drilling that is, and is going to be, taking place in the County is quite disturbing. How much do we have to loose in the long term before we stop grabbing at short-term gain?