Police, library get thumbs up, County at odds with Barrie over budget requests

Barrie Public Library staff ask council for funds to consider new branch.

Two out of three service partners for the City of Barrie are falling in line with the city’s vision for its budget requests, according to city council.

On Wednesday, council heard from Barrie Police, the Barrie Public Library and County of Simcoe, each making their case for why the city’s contributions to their operations is going up.

While council will not give official approval of each of their requests until later this month, council was generally in favour of both the police budget and library budget.

“Two out of three have I think yielded the results that we were looking for last year,” said Barrie Mayor Alex Nuttall. “I think what we’ve witnessed from both the police and from the library is trying to find other ways to do it, trying to find other places to get the right resources in place.”

Barrie police presented a budget of $72.24 million, accounting for a 6.99 per cent increase from last year.

Of that, councillors heard that 95 per cent was tied up in salaries and benefits.

“When you compare it to what other municipalities are experiencing, this is significantly lower than what I know my counterparts in some of our small bordering municipalities that are using the OPP for instance,” said Councillor Gary Harvey. “I’ve been hearing the number between 10 and 20 from them when it comes to percentage increases and I know Peel seems to be the highest increase in the province at 23.3 per cent.”

City Council heard that the library is only seeking a small increase of about one per cent from taxpayers this year.

Of its total budgeted expenses of $10.85 million, the City’s portion of those account for just over $9.91 million, an increase from $9.81 million the year prior.

The library made a separate request Wednesday night for an additional $75,000 to fund the design and layout for a new library branch in the city’s northwest corner. That funding would also include community consultations and demographic analysis, council heard.

“The 2025 budget reflects a careful balance between meeting rising community needs and managing costs,” said library board trustee Austin Mitchell. “While the increases in salaries, materials and the community navigator program addresses our growing populations demands, we’ve identified efficiencies in other areas such as contracted services, to mitigate the overall budget increase.”

Councillors heard that Barrie’s share of the County of Simcoe’s budget is increasing again this year, largely driven up by social housing, among other factors.

Barrie’s share of the county’s budget comes to $26,875,000 in total operating costs and $12,381,000 in total adjusted capital costs.

The operating portion of the budget is increasing by 2.9 per cent, or about $767,000.

Of note, the County’s General Manager of corporate performance, Trevor Wilcox, told council that important capital projects are driving up costs.

For example, the county will breaking ground this year on the Rose Street project, which has an estimated budget of $217 million.

Mayor Nuttall brought up a recent value-for-money service audit, which determined that the county has been providing Barrie with value for the services it provides.

However, that same report made some recommendations — including how Barrie pays back on capital projects.

It said that Barrie should payback towards the lifespan of the project, rather than a 10-year-period.

When asked if the county was open to re-evaluating how the city pays for capital projects, GM Wilcox told the mayor that a future report reflecting the findings of the value-for-service audit will investigate that.

Barrie’s general committee will debate the budget on Jan. 22, then city council give its final approval on Jan. 29.