For 2025, Bradford residents are set see a smaller tax bump than the 4.21 per cent in 2024.
After 1.5 days of marathon budget deliberations, council approved a revised version of the draft 2025 budget on Nov. 13, which includes a tax levy increase of 2.7 per cent — or roughly an additional $145.22 for the average home.
In Bradford, the province’s Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC) assessed the average home at $516,919.
“We built a pretty good consensus,” Mayor James Leduc said. “Council all worked together to get the best budget for the right price. Everybody has needs and wants, and I think we went hard on the needs only.”
That includes the need for nine more police officers expected to be included in the South Simcoe Police Service’s budget, which is anticipated to be presented to council next month and come with an estimated increase of about $1.29 million for Bradford.
That could have seen the town’s tax levy increase by as much as 4.7 per cent, but council plans to stave off the bump for 2025 by covering the cost with revenue from the automated speed enforcement (ASE) program, which collected fines of about $1.52 million in 2024 with about another $4.18 million projected in 2025.
Still, councillors felt more had to be cut from the base budget, including council’s own raises for 2025, saving taxpayers a combined $58,700.
“We talk about people hurting all the time,” Ward 6 Coun. Nickolas Harper said in recommending council salaries remain static for 2025. “I’m a big proponent of actually putting my money where my mouth is.”
For the second time, council also voted to defer the proposed new director of strategic initiatives which was projected to cost $258,851 in 2025 as part of the town’s ongoing corporate restructuring.
Town chief administrative officer Geoff McKnight explained the new position is intended to both oversee the new department and also pursue innovation, lead special projects and drive partnerships — something he said is currently “challenging” for staff to do on top of their regular duties.
However, councillors weren’t swayed, with Ward 3 Coun. Ben Verkaik suggesting the changes to better position the town for 2051 should be done more gradually and Ward 1 Coun. Cheraldean Duhaney saying the town has become too “top heavy.”
“We need more boots on the ground and less bums on the seats,” she said.
To that end, councillors did approve several new front-line positions with total costs to the tax levy including:
- transit coordinator — $144,025
- digital transformation and experience lead — $133,726
- human resources advisor — $123,898
- fire prevention inspector — $121,673
- events coordinator for recreation and cultural services — $105,549
- bookings clerk for recreation and cultural services — $96,425
- information services supervisor for the library — $92,316
- two seasonal park attendants — $78,123
- two summer students for the transportation department — $41,804
- three summer students for the parks department — $17,535
- development review engineer for growth services — $0 ($159,917 to be funded from user fees and reserves)
Of several positions which were not approved was a new planner for the community planning department at a total cost of $128,226.
That was intended to help facilitate development and process approvals as the town’s population is expected to grow by about 40,000 to reach about 84,000 by 2051.
Having that position removed from the base budget didn’t sit well with the mayor, who sees it as a “critical” need.
“Time is money, and if you don’t have enough planners in place, we end up losing time, and that costs everybody money and that’s not good,” he said after the meeting. “We’re going to have the growth — I don’t care what anybody says.”
When asked after the meeting if he would consider using his strong mayor veto powers to include the position, Leduc said he would review the idea later.
The budget was initially presented to councillors on Nov. 7, and in the strong-mayor system, they have 30 days to propose amendments, after which time the mayor has 10 days to veto those amendments. Following that, council has 15 days to use a two-thirds majority to override the mayor’s veto.
If a strong mayor does not attempt to veto any amendments within the 10 days, then the budget as amended would be deemed approved.
Council voted to shorten their amendment period to Nov. 14, and the mayor can follow by issuing a mayoral decision to wave his veto.
When pushed to do so by councillors during the meeting, the mayor said he first wanted to see if the County of Simcoe’s tax levy could be reduced, and if it is, he might use his veto to allocate Bradford’s savings to help cover the cost of the planner position.
Upon being granted the new powers last year, the mayor initially pledged not to use them, and while he didn’t veto anything in the 2024 budget, he later invoked his authority to change the structure of some council committees.
“I guess I broke my promise earlier. I already did that once,” he said during the meeting. “I’m not afraid to do that. In the right circumstances I will use it.”
As senior staff presented their department’s budgets, councillors discussed and picked out the items they felt were most important to add or remove, compiling a list for consideration. By the time all the departments had presented, that list contained enough changes to trim the projected increase of 3.14 per cent down to the 2.7-per-cent figure.
After the meeting, the mayor said he had initially wanted to hit just 2.5 per cent, but during the administrative review with senior staff in the month leading up to the release of the draft 2025 budget, it was determined that would have impacted services.
At the start of deliberations on Tuesday afternoon, Ian Goodfellow, the town’s director of finance and treasurer, shared that County of Simcoe council had tentatively approved their budget with an increase of 3.63 per cent, which would bring the total tax increase projected for Bradford residents down to 3.14 per cent from the 3.51 per cent initially proposed in the draft 2025 budget.
County council could ratify its budget as early as Nov. 26.
