Yesterday afternoon, Saskatoon City Council deliberated on mid-cycle adjustments to the City’s budget to close Saskatoon’s $8M+ budget deficit. In the end, Council was able to partially close the gap, resulting in a rate increase to 3.93% for commercial and residential property taxpayers.

The Chamber had urged City Council to freeze the tax rate set 12 months ago (leave at 3.53%) by reducing spending and costs as necessary, and deferring the hiring or re-hiring of 30 positions (minimum) to help close the budget gap. Employee wages and payroll costs amount to 60% of the City’s Operating Budget. Hiring affects today’s budget, and future ones, as the cost of employing people escalates over time.

Council made other adjustments and proceeded with the planned hiring of 78 positions. The number of city staff, including police officers, will go up by 77.6 Full Time Equivalent (FTE) positions. Remai Modern will get three more full-time staff for a total of four, and Saskatoon Transit will get an extra four hires, for a total of 10 in 2023. Utilities will see another 21 FTE positions.

The City’s operating budget is feeling pressure of wage inflation. For example, when you look at City employees who make over $50K per year, total earnings have increased over $54M in 5 years. 

In this same period, 365 additional positions have rolled over the $50K mark. There’s been a big jump (40%) in positions now earning between $90-100K and over $100K. Positions earning more than $200K has doubled from 9 to 20.

While the deficit was framed as a revenue problem, we believe it’s largely a spending problem that can be solved by managing staff levels and adjusting service standard to more affordable levels.

Commercial ratepayers, and our economy, cannot keep pace with the growing size and spending priorities of the City’s Budget. We will continue to raise these concerns in the months ahead.