Below are my comments on the 2024 Budget. I encourage you to submit your own comments to the city clerk using the link below. If enough people speak up, even with just a one line comment saying "NO", collectively we can make a difference and persuade Council to send the budget back for reductions.

Growing Expenses
In 2011 the Mayor voted for his first budget. That budget contained total expenses of $40,140,392. At that time Owen Sound’s population was 21,688. The latest financial information available to the public is contained in the 2022 Audited Financial Statements. These statements show that in the 11 years following the first budget the Mayor approved, expenses grew to $59,753,592 while Owen Sound’s population reduced to 21,612. If approved the 2024 budget will increase spending to $62 million. That’s an increase of 55% in just 12 years. On average the budget has been growing by $1.8 million per year. If approved the 2024 budget will increase spending by $2.2 million. Owen Sound’s spending is projected to reach $74.0 million by 2030 if spending continues at the current rate and taxes will grow by 24.2% from their 2022 value. Owen Sound is the poorest community in Grey-Bruce and residents cannot afford these annual tax increases.

Poor Performance Comparisons
The Town of Cobourg is nearly identical to Owen Sound in population, population-density, and in the number of occupied dwellings. In 2022 Owen Sound had 79 employees earning over $100,000 while Cobourg had only 53. As well, Owen Sound collected $6.5 million more in taxes than Cobourg; spent $2.6 million more than Cobourg on just Salaries and Benefits and spent $4.9 million more than Cobourg to deliver nearly identical services. Also of note was that in 2023 Owen Sound received $1,961,600 in provincial grants while Cobourg received only $35,600. Although Owen Sound spent $1.4 million more than Cobourg for winter maintenance, the provincial grants more than make up this difference.

Cobourg was able to achieve this level of efficiency by fostering an entrepreneurial culture at City Hall that provides a welcoming environment for both businesses and residents. Cobourg, like Tillsonburg, has developed profit centers to reduce their dependency on tax revenue. Both of these municipalities get only 47% of their revenue from taxes while Owen Sound gets 51% of its revenue from taxation.

Someone might argue that they can find a similar municipality somewhere in Ontario that doesn’t compare well to Owen Sound. Although I don’t believe one exists, it really doesn’t matter.  The point is, that if Cobourg, a nearly identical municipality, can deliver similar services for $6.5 million less than Owen Sound, than Owen Sound is not performing as well as it could and it is up to members of council to correct this problem.

Absence of Business Acumen
Consider that a municipality is really a service delivery business whose leadership consists of an operational Board of Directors and a CEO who are elected by shareholders every 4 years. Like any business a municipality competes with others for new customers (residents & businesses) to relocate to their area to enable them to purchase their services. In Owen Sound’s case there’s been a steady migration of customers to other municipalities over the past 25 years because of the high price of services and Council’s failure to develop an attractive environment for new residents and businesses to relocate to Owen Sound. In other words as a business Owen Sound is underperforming.

We have members of council who manage businesses and I’m sure they will agree that no business could survive if it followed Owen Sound’s lead of constantly raising prices without regard its customer’s ability to pay or its competitor’s pricing strategy. The Owen Sound administration is completely absent of any entrepreneurial spirit and fosters a traditional bureaucratic environment that addresses problems by hiring additional staff to help out instead of addressing the inefficiencies at the root of the problem. This would not happen in any Owen Sound business and if it did, that business would be bankrupt within a year.

It's Time For  Tough Decisions*
Owen Sound is the only municipality of its size that has two Human Resource Managers, three managers in the municipal clerk’s office and is also the only municipality of its size to employ a Senior Manager of Strategic Initiatives. The draft 2024 budget contains two new part time positions which will have an ongoing annual cost of $104,000 per year.

In his end year address the Mayor commented on how busy everyone was and that staff had booked 200 hours in overtime. Could it be that we have too many staff attending meetings who really don’t need to be there? We recently saw seven (7) members of staff attending a River District Meeting. They outnumbered the business owners. Could it be that staff are assigned activities that are not related to directly supporting the delivery of services? Or, to put it more succinctly, could it be that one of the reasons for historically high expenses is that staff are not being managed as efficiently as they would be if there was a measure of Business Acumen at city hall? Council needs to STOP trying to make excuses for the Out-of-Control expenses and STOP trying to downplay the magnitude of the disparity and START to implement solutions to resolve the high expenses.

.A Living Wage
Half of Owen Sound households take home less than $57,600. Assuming two wage earners per household that works out to be about $18 per hour before taxes. The 2024 budget contains an increase to ensure all employees earn a living wage yet Council appears to be fine with 50% of Owen Sound’s population not earning a living wage and is content with adding to their problems by approving another tax increase. Council needs to show the same respect and consideration to Owen Sound residents that it shows for city hall employees.

Fiduciary Obligation
The Municipal Act states that members of council have the responsibility to “Represent the public and consider the well-being and interests of the municipality”. It is the responsibility of each member of council to ensure that the city is being run as efficiently as possible. Right now, the facts show that Owen Sound can and should do better.

When presented with irrefutable evidence that there are serious disparities when compared to similar municipalities, each member of council has the responsibility to take effective action to eliminate those disparities in accordance with the Municipal Act.

The bottom line is that Owen Sound city hall has room for improvement and Owen Sound residents cannot afford another tax increase. I urge each member of council to live up to their responsibilities and on behalf of the residents of Owen Sound send the budget back.

Here is a simple and easy recipe to begin the process of resolving Owen Sound’s chronic spending problems.

A Simple Recipe for Success in 2024

1. Send the draft 2024 budget back for expense reductions sufficient to achieve a zero percent tax increase.

2. Prepare a new draft budget by fully implementing Zero-Based Budgeting

3. Include in the budget the estimated savings from donating our $30 million Art Collection to the County.

4. Include in the budget the estimated savings from cost sharing agreements for the Bayshore and Rec Center.