Police gun range, pavement money among items approved by council without boosting property taxes
CBC
Tapping Calgary's reserve funds to pay for one-time projects was one of the themes present during city council's budget deliberations on Thursday.
Council approved some notable investments during their fourth consecutive day of budget talks, however, none of the items receiving money will raise property taxes.
Instead, the capital is coming from the city's various reserve funds.
Reserves will be used to pay for items such as a cost overrun on a new firearms training range for the Calgary Police Service (CPS), paving more roads and doing repairs to several recreation facilities.
None of those items were funded in the original budget adjustments presented by city administration.
Next year will already see a $36-million increase for pavement maintenance, but on Thursday, council voted unanimously to take an additional $20 million from Calgary's Future Capital reserve to put toward improvement the pavement quality.
"This just makes sense," said Ward 14 Coun. Peter Demong who put the motion forward to use that money,
"The sooner we can start repairing the roads, the cheaper it will be in the long run. It's just the way roads work. So let's vote this in, let's get it done and let's just fix the damn roads."
City council also approved using reserves to pay for a $10-million cost overrun on a new CPS firearms training range.
In September, CBC News reported that the Calgary Police Commission (CPC) proposed CPS use unallocated money from the Community Safety Investment Framework (CSIF) to cover the cost overruns of a new firearms range for the Calgary Police Service.
Costs associated with the new gun range ballooned to a total of $23 million or 130 per cent higher than the project's original $10-million estimate.
The CSIF money is used to fund community partner agencies that provide help for people with mental health or addictions issues, rather than relying on the police.
CPS puts $8 million annually into the fund and that amount is matched by the City of Calgary.
Originally, the plan was to take $5 million in 2024 funds, $4 million in 2025 and $4 million in 2026 from CSIF to pay for the gun range.
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