Central Huron Council moving ahead with 2026 budget with levy increase under two per cent
BY SHAWN LOUGHLIN
Director of Finance Jeff Boyes made short work of the 2026 budget process, garnering support from council, which approved an accelerated timeline that will see the budget up for adoption on Monday.
After two meetings to discuss the operational budgets for the municipality’s departments, Boyes presented the consolidated draft budget for the first time on Monday night, beginning with a 4.36 per cent increase to the levy, which equates to a 3.19 per cent rate increase due to assessment growth in the past year. The budget includes a handful of new expenditures, but is offset handsomely by a surplus of just under $1.4 million.
However, council opted to take it a bit farther to bring the projected increase down. Staff had proposed a $300,000 contribution to the tax stabilization reserve. However, council suggested that half of that could come from the municipality’s Nuclear Waste Management Organization (NWMO) reserve, which Ginn said has over $800,000 in it, bringing the tax levy increase to approximately 1.7 per cent.
This tax levy increase will be the lowest in years in Central Huron. Increases ranged from three per cent to seven-and-a-half per cent in the last six years, while council implemented a 5.35 per cent decrease to the tax levy in 2020 as the pandemic hit residents’ pocketbooks hard.
New items added into the budget include $10,000 for the 100th anniversary celebration for the Sloman School Car, $13,139 for expansion at the Regional Equine and Agricultural Centre of Huron (REACH), $45,000 for a part-time facilities labourer, $20,000 for the community improvement accessibility budget and $150,000 for a used tractor and flail mower.
The budget conversation began with consideration of bringing roadside grass-cutting in-house, which is why the used tractor, flail mower and blower, as well as an additional roads operator, are included in the budget. Roads Manager Brady Nolan made the recommendation in a report at council’s Monday night budget meeting and council passed it with little discussion.
Deputy-Mayor Marg Anderson continued to vent her concerns about what she sees as the ballooning of the Community Improvement Department budget.
After pointing out that the budget had increased by over 52 per cent in recent years, Anderson suggested that the $20,000 for an accessibility project within the department could be sourced from reserves. If the additional funds were to be approved, Anderson said that would mean that the department’s budget will have increased by over 67 per cent in the last few years, which she felt was simply unsustainable.
Despite her case, no one spoke up to support the argument, so her suggestion was not taken up by the rest of council.
The only other minor change suggested also came from Anderson, which is that $5,000 in the “Ward 2” reserve be used for kitchen renovations at the Auburn Community Hall. That money was slated to come from another reserve, but Anderson suggested the money could come from the specific reserve, which is meant for projects from the former Ward 2, which included Auburn before those boundaries were eliminated.
With very little conversation from council, Boyes correctly assumed that councillors were in favour of his first swing at the budget. As a result, he recommended cancelling the scheduled budget meetings on March 7 and April 8 and moving ahead with a final draft of the budget for adoption at council’s regular meeting on Monday, March 16. Council agreed and passed the motion.