Fiscally Responsible
Being fiscally responsible so that I can deliver to taxpayers is extremely important to me. Doing my due diligence is equally important. That is why when making a vote at council is the most important thing that I do. Sure the public events are nice to go to and funding announcements are exciting but ultimately, the way that I have delivered best service to taxpayers takes place in preparation for my meetings. I take time and review my packets no matter which board that I sit on and ask questions ahead of time if needed and if I think that the public would want any particular questions asked, I choose to ask on their behalf in open session. As a taxpayer, I have spent time being extremely frustrated when I realized that councillors didn’t read their packages well. It is so essential to have a good understanding and to ensure that you have a sufficient amount of information to make a decision that is in the best interest of the City of Saint John.
Being on the finance committee has been one of the biggest responsibilities that I have had. We have a 208 Million dollar budget and spending, saving and paying down debt responsibly is one of the best things that I can do to keep Saint John growing and thriving and that is exactly what I have done in the last 5 years. I go over that budget line by line and review it up against the previous budgets and at different stages, I look at projected outcomes and where we currently sit and when needed, I challenge staff why the budget is where it is and if it is coming over, I challenge them to see if there is a way to readjust things now so that we can come in on budget at the end of the year to avoid going into reserves.
We have financial policies now thanks to the previous council and our council decisions and I have followed those policies. It is essential that we plan and try to do what we can to mitigate risks. Having the risk management plan in place that occurred during our term and using an efficient ERP system which is currently being done, are two things that can help us plan better and keep things organized and departments working in lockstep with one another.
The next step that I see the city going is with a performance management system that is consistent across the board. This is the best way to see where there are gaps in the system and what is causing the gaps so that management can reconfigure things, test the key performance indicators and restart the process. This is something that I have been advocating for since being elected and something that I feel confident will get done under current management. I hope to help push this along because if the City of Saint John becomes more efficient, then taxpayers will get better service delivery. I appreciate staff that have listened to my advocacy and look forward to it becoming part of the continuous improvement at City hall.
One of the biggest things that I wanted to make a change on before getting into office was lowering the tax rate. Why would a city want to do that? Well, I believe that the City of Saint John was not competitive with other cities which would impact the community when it comes to businesses looking for a place to set up shop and developers going to make investments in housing. Saint John had the highest tax rate in New Brunswick when I was elected. Our council got to lower our tax rate by 25 cents which has never happened in the history of Saint John so the tax rate has gone from 1.78 to 1.53 in just 5 years. I hope to continue the momentum but that will depend on the situation going forward. If I have the chance to serve again and if I see an opportunity to continue to lower the tax rate without stripping the community of needed services, I will push to lower it as much as possible. It has to be done responsibly though. It is only worth it if people can still have a high level of service and a great quality of life. Set a goal and delivered for you!
But what about the debt? I am proud to share that the debt was at 119 million dollars in 2021 and has gone down 64 million dollars in just 5 years. Yes, that is 12.8 million average a year in debt reduction! Incredible. So we have lowered the tax rate by 25 cents and lowered your debt by 64 million dollars so there can’t be anymore good news right?! Wrong! There was interest on all of that and every year the city was spending 16.7 million dollars of debt but because it has been reduced so much citizens are only paying 12.9 million dollars per year. That is still a lot but it is saving 3.8 million dollars a year. We can do a whole lot with that money for you and if elected I will strive to make even more decisions like this.
No politician does this on their own and we work hard but all of the heavy lifting is done by staff. Thank you for CFO Fudge and his team for creating these policies, pushing them forward and being disciplined to enforce them. The citizens of Saint John are reaping the benefits from your leadership.