Cheery Thoughts on a Winters Day

Jeff Green | Jan 25, 2017

South Frontenac and Frontenac County have both completed their budgets for 2017.  While it may not have been a picnic for either of them, they were both at a significant advantage when compared to what politicians in smaller, more remote townships will be facing over the next few weeks. Take the example of North Frontenac, which will certainly be hit with a monumental budget squeeze when they meet later this week to consider their 2017 budget.

One of the factors at play is assessment. Any growth in North Frontenac due to new construction last year was offset by a drop in value for existing properties. In the most recent assessment cycle that was completed by the Municipal Property Assessment Corporation last year, property values in the township were flat. The total value of properties in North Frontenac this year is up by 0.06% over last year, almost nothing. This means that all increases in required payments to outside bodies will lead to increases in local taxation. North Frontenac is facing a big increase in policing costs, and the impact of the Frontenac County budget on North Frontenac Township will also be severe.

When Frontenac County approved their budget in December, they announced an increase of 3.15%. But that number was based in part on a 1% increase in assessment in the county as a whole due to growth. Since North Frontenac did not share in that growth, the net impact of the county levy to North Frontenac is actually a 5% increase.

On top of all that North Frontenac is committed to a building project at the township office that will cost between $1.5 and $2 million. It will be financed over several years, but some money has to be put aside to cover annual loan payments in this budget.

The upshot is that Council may indeed be looking at a significant increase this year, and tax rates in smaller townships such as North and Central Frontenac and Addington Highlands are already substantially higher than those in urban centres and larger rural municipalities like South Frontenac.

North Frontenac share services where possible with Central Frontenac and Addington Highlands, and have offloaded some costs over the years for planning and IT services by contracting out to Frontenac County, but the tax burden for ratepayers goes up and up.

Combined with increases in transportation and hydro costs, it is becoming more and more expensive to live in small, rural townships. And since employment is hard to come by as well, it might well be the case in the not too distant future that the permanent resident population in small municipalities, which has been dipping slightly year after year, will start to drop substantially.