MAPLETON – User fees and charges for permits, animal control, site plan control, severances, facility rentals, water and wastewater, and other municipal services in Mapleton will be increasing on Jan. 1.
Council approved the increases recommended by staff at a public meeting on Oct. 8, with one amendment.
The amendment was regarding cemetery fees, which were the only fees discussed during the meeting.
Heritage Funeral Homes director Ken Thompson questioned a proposed $1,535 fee for columbarium niche interment rights.
A columbarium niche is a structure for storing urns holding cremated remains.
“When the rates were set for the columbarium it was based on cost recovery,” Thompson noted. “And when the increase was proposed last year, council was gracious enough to not increase from that $1,500.”
In Minto, Thompson said columbarium rates do not increase, and at Bethesda Community Cemetery and Derryadd Cemetery in Mapleton, rates increase with new columbariums.
Thompson also questioned the interment right rates for adult regular plots, which are going up from $1,220 to $1,375.
Previously, council approved a phased-in schedule of increases to cemetery fees that brought the adult regular plot rate to $1,345 in 2025, Thompson said.
Township finance director Patrick Kelly said the $1,345 figure is the increased cost without accounting for consumer price index increases.
“The consumer price index is at 2.4 per cent,” he said, “and that’s what brought it to $1,375.
“Staff worked to develop estimates to reach a state of cost recovery, or our best efforts to do so,” Kelly added. “That’s what’s before you in the bylaw, and we stand behind that.”
The township’s cemeteries were budgeted to operate at a net deficit of $65,000 in 2024, he noted.
“That’s quite rare in most municipalities to have that significant of a portion of funding for cemeteries to come from the tax base,” he said.
Additionally the township’s long-term capital forecasts includes about $175,000 in capital costs for cemeteries, Kelly said.
“The existing reserve fund balance for the cemeteries is at $5,100, so obviously some work needs to be done from a rates perspective, to build sufficient funding for the long-term capital needs of the cemeteries.”
“Patrick’s advice is sage, and it’s exactly what we want coming out of that chair,” said councillor Michael Martin.
But he noted, “We’re not going to make up a $65,000 deficit in columbarium charges,” and suggested keeping the columbarium interment rights as is and only applying inflation to opening and closing interment charges.
“We are in the red, obviously, and I think we probably expect to be there for a period of time,” Martin said.
“I think it’s reasonable, as far as tax payers go, and its a service we provide. We certainly run other services at a much higher deficit.”
Thompson pointed out “most of the people that are going into the cemetery … are also those people that have been taxpayers in the community of a number of years, and also have helped fund other areas in the municipality such as our arena and parks and rec and so on and so forth, which I don’t think are 100% cost recovery as well.”
Mayor and council discussed postponing the decision about increasing fees and charges to the next council meeting, to get clarification about the cemetery increases.
But Kelly noted “the budget that we are preparing to bring forward and table at the next council meeting is based upon all of the other rate adjustments that are in the fees and charges bylaw.
If the bylaw didn’t pass at the Oct. 8 meeting, staff may “have to rework a lot of budget estimates that we’ve been preparing to this point,” Kelly noted.
Councillors did not postpone the decision, but instead approved the bylaw with an amendment, proposed by councillor Amanda Reid, for columbarium internment right fees.
These fees will stay at $1,500, without consumer price index increases, until the next columbarium is built.
Fees and charges increased in the approved bylaw include:
- dog tags: from $25 to $35 per dog;
- minor variances, zoning amendments, site plan control approvals, amendments and inspections, severances, and official plan amendments, which are increasing by 17.3% plus the consumer price index;
- permits, drainage apportionment agreements, hidden driveway signs, firewood and woodchips, which are increasing by the consumer price index; and
- PMD, Maryborough Community Centre, and Drayton ball diamond and soccer field rentals, which are increasing by the consumer price index.
