Kincardine council hikes garbage bag tags to $2.50 each during budget talks

If you haven't got a year's worth of garbage bag tags, you may want to purchase some before Kincardine council finalizes its 2017 budget.

In committee-of-the-whole last night (Jan. 23), council agreed to hike the cost of bag tags to $2.50 each from the current $2. Treasurer Roxana Baumann said that, based on 140,000 tags per year, that would increase revenue by $70,000 for this year.

Councillor Randy Roppel objected to the increase, saying the $2 fee was fair. “If we add 50 cents, what does that gain us? It's less than half a per cent. Leave it at $2.”

“We've been getting away with paying nothing for a long time,” said councillor Maureen Couture. “In 1997-98, the Town of Kincardine was charging $2.50 per bag tag, with no free ones, and the people of Kincardine managed just fine. I say charge $2.50 or $3 per bag tag. You should pay for the waste collection the same way you pay for wastewater – through a user-pay system.”

“We gain half a per cent by adding 50 cents,” said councillor Andrew White, “but we gain 0.9 per cent with a $3 bag tag which may be better. I have no problem charging $3 for a bag tag.”

“I'm thinking of the people out there struggling to pay their bills,” argued Roppel. “What's best for the people we represent?”

“Many of the constituents I talked to are seniors on fixed income,” said deputy mayor Jacqueline Faubert. “They'd rather pay $3 for a bag tag than subsidize waste removal on the their tax bills. Most generate only half a bag of garbage per week, so the cost for them is only $1.50 per week.”

Councillor Laura Haight said it's an interesting discussion, but there are a large number of seasonal residents whose properties are highly-assessed, yet are here only part of the year.

“For them, that's the downside of our water rate,” she said. “However, with the bag tags, our seasonal residents use this service only sporadically, while our full-time residents, including seniors on fixed incomes, use it 12 months of the year.”

She said that since the taxpayer-funded “free” bag tags were just discontinued a couple of years ago, she is not prepared to increase the fee to $2.50 yet.

Councillor Gordon Campbell was fine with a $2.50 charge for bag tags. “Some people put out twice as much as others, so they should pay.”

Mayor Anne Eadie said she thought the municipality had agreed to keep the cost at $2 once the “free” tags were removed from the system, at least through to the end of this term of council.

“Council did not make a commitment for the term,” argued Couture. “It may have been for the budget year, but there was no policy approved for that.”

“If we had made that commitment, then the treasurer would not have made the suggestion to change the fee,” said Haight.

In a straw vote later, committee-of-the-whole agreed to increase the cost to $2.50 per bag tag, adding $53,000 in revenue to the budget. The $53,000 is prorated based on an implementation date of March 1, said Baumann, after the meeting.

It was also agreed to give a $10,000 grant to the 2018 Kincardine Reunion committee, and to leave the grant at $3,000 each for three major events: the Kincardine Scottish Festival, Bruce Telecom Lighthouse Blues Festival, and the Kincardine Summer Music Festival.

This reduced the tax-rate increase to 8.84 per cent, from a proposal 9.2 per cent, for the municipal portion only. This equates to about $124 for an average residential assessment of $244,000.

The next budget meeting is slated for Monday, Feb. 6, at 5 p.m., at the municipal administration centre.