St. Albert city council will be busy this week.
May 16 will see council have two separate meetings in order for officials to work through finalizing the 2023 tax rate bylaw, mandating helmet use for all ages on all non-motorized micro-mobility modes of travel, amending the scope of two city projects, working through a strategy for the use long-term debt, and much more.
Council will be looking to give this year's tax rate bylaw all three required readings on Tuesday, which barring any unexpected changes during the meeting will finalize this year's property tax increase at 4.1 per cent.
A report prepared for council by administration explains that the 2023 mill rate, or tax levied per set amount of property value, for residential homes is 8.23, meaning that for every $100,000 of assessed property value, homeowners will be taxed $822.52.
For non-residential property owners, this year's mill rate is 12.54, meaning property owners will pay $1,253.53 for every $100,000 of property value.
The Gazette will have an article dedicated to the 2023 tax rate bylaw with more information about what St. Albertans can expect to see on their tax notice in the Thursday, May 18 edition of the newspaper.
New helmet rules
Council will also be voting on a list of amendments to the city's traffic bylaw on May 16, including an amendment that will make wearing a helmet mandatory for all ages when use bicycles, skateboards, roller blades, in-line skates, and E-scooters.
The traffic bylaw currently requires only those under 12 to wear a helmet when skateboarding or roller-blading, although helmets are currently mandatory for all ages in St. Albert.
Helmets were mandatory while using of E-scooters throughout the two year program, which council recently voted to make permanent in the city starting this summer, however city peace officers didn't issue a single ticket for those non-compliant throughout the pilot program.
Those caught without a safety helmet could face a $100 fine, according to the draft bylaw council will be deciding on.
Other amendments include the explicit prohibition of 'tandem' E-scooter use, meaning only one person will be allowed to ride a scooter at a time, and a location change for the speed limit transition on Sir Winston Churchill Avenue near the Poundmaker Road intersection.
The Gazette will have an article dedicated to the traffic bylaw amendments in the Thursday, May 18 edition of the newspaper.
Debt strategy
After Tuesday's regular council meeting, mayor and council will take part in a standing committee of the whole meeting to work through a strategy-session for the city's use of long-term debt to fund projects.
According to a backgrounder prepared by Diane McMordie, the city's Chief Financial Officer, many of the upcoming capital projects deemed a priority for council come with substantial price tags, and will be unable to continue without debt financing.
These priority projects, McMordie's backgrounder says, include the servicing of Lakeview Business District (estimated at $80 million), continued land servicing in the city's northeast (estimated at $56 million, although will be 100 per cent recoverable through off-site levies), and the third phase of roadwork on St. Albert Trail (estimated at $16.6 million).
“With the exception of the last couple of years, historically the city has taken on very little debt in order to advance priority projects, with many of those projects delayed for multiple years,” McMordie wrote. “The main challenge we are facing today is that we review and approve capital projects (sometimes with debt financing) on an annual or ad-hoc basis without really analyzing the impact of those decisions on the future.”
“Choosing to debt finance something today is a decision to not move forward with other projects in the future. To this end, we need to start taking a longer term view as we make decisions.”
Since the city is limited in how much outstanding debt can be on the books at any given time, and with the steep costs attributed to many of the planned and critical projects waiting for funding, McMordie wrote that the city is seeing a “a bit of perfect storm” because each new debenture taken out by the city will necessitate a tax increase.
The Gazette will have an article dedicated to council's debt strategy discussion in the Thursday, May 18 edition of the newspaper, and, if needed, a secondary article in the Thursday, May 25 edition of the newspaper.
Project scope changes
Administration is also seeking council's approval to change the scope of two already underway projects, the decommissioning of the former Fire Hall #1, and the renovation and expansion of St. Albert's RCMP headquarters.
For the Fire Hall #1 decommissioning project, administration is simply asking for council to approve using some of the project's remaining funds to decommission and demolish 13 Mission Ave, which was formerly the location of the Northern Alberta Business Incubator (NABI).
In 2021 council voted to stop financially supporting NABI, and directed administration to develop a remediation plan for the building, which is roughly 80 years old and no longer usable.
As the building has been vacant for nearly two full years, administration says demolishing the building and developing a new plan for the plot of land is the best course of action.
Another city project with a slight change in scope that administration is looking to get council's approval on is the scaled-back renovation and expansion plan for St. Albert's RCMP building, Maloney Place.
As part of the 2022 budget, council approved a $5 million project charter that planned to add a second floor to Maloney Place, expand the parking lot, and renovate the first floor of the nearby Beaudry Place, which will also be taken over by the RCMP, who have also been operating out of the second floor of the building since 2013.
In the time since council approved the project charter, construction costs have increased to the point where the planned work would involve about $600,000 in overspending.
As such, administration is asking council to approve a scaled-down version of the project to only include partial renovations of Maloney Place, the parking lot expansion (which is almost complete), and the renovation of the first floor of Beaudry Place.
As well, because it falls outside of the scope of the project and the city's borrowing bylaw, administration is asking council to approve the use of $350,000 from the capital reserve to renovate a part of St. Albert Place in order to accommodate the city's community services staff who are being displaced because of the RCMP's take over of the first floor of Beaudry Place.
The Gazette will have an article about council's decisions on these two projects in the Thursday, May 18 edition of the newspaper.
