With the budget process set to move into the final stages and work still to be done, Mapleton council is currently looking at a 5.75 per cent tax rate increase for 2016.
That would translate into roughly a $215 increase in the total tax bill (including county and school taxes) on a residence assessed at $300,000 said Mayor Neil Driscoll.
Council was to hold a special meeting for final budget review on Jan. 6 (results were not known by press time).
As currently configured, the draft budget would increase the township’s total levy requirement by 20.3%, or just over $1 million from $5.01 million to $6.03 million.
An open house to present the draft budget to the public is scheduled for Jan. 14 at 6pm at the Maryborough Community Centre in Moorefield.
Around $6.5 million worth of projects aimed at improving water and wastewater capacity, long a stumbling block to growth in Mapleton, and upgrading the Maryborough Community Centre and numerous road and bridge projects are among the capital items under consideration.
Continued work on the new municipal maintenance facility will also factor into capital spending plans. Availability of federal and provincial grant funding to offset project costs will also factor into decisions on the capital program.
The draft budget is projecting about $9.08 million in expenditures against $3.05 million in revenue, leaving $6.03 million to be raised by taxation.
An asset management plan prepared in 2014 projected the township should plan for a 5.8% levy increase every year for the next 10 years and 3.4% per year after that to generate enough funds to eliminate the municipality’s “infrastructure deficit.”
