HALIFAX—Firefighting and libraries were on the chopping block at city hall as council continued its budget meetings, hoping to soften the blow of an inevitable increase to property taxes.

To maintain current staffing levels across the municipality, finance staff recommended an above-inflation increase to the average property tax bill of 2.9 per cent. Council is aiming to keep the increase to the average bill at 1.9 per cent, and asked every municipal department to bring its most cut-up budget to council chambers.

On Friday, Halifax Regional Fire and Emergency Chief Ken Stuebing brought his department’s budget to council’s budget committee, offering up a cut of an extra $1 million to his already slashed budget.

Firefighting is one of the municipality’s largest line items, making up 14 cents for every tax dollar last year.

To get in line with staff’s recommended tax increase of 2.9 per cent, Stuebing was told to prepare a budget of $71,850,000. To get there, he had to cut $3,405,200.

To get to a budget corresponding to council’s desired 1.9 per cent increase, he’d have to cut another $997,000.

Stuebing made the first $3.4 million in cuts using what he called “aggressive” overtime budgeting, but said service levels — meaning responding to fires in the proper amount of time — could be maintained.

The next million in cuts wouldn’t be so easy, resulting in “decreased front line service,” longer emergency response times and a decreased ability to train firefighters.

“The writing’s on the wall,” Stuebing told councillors. “There’s no other way to take that kind of money from our budget without affecting staffing.”

Stuebing asked councillors to keep that money in the budget and add $363,000 to staff the station in Fall River with career firefighters 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Council approved new response times in December, and the station in Fall River, currently staffed by a mix of career and volunteer firefighters, needs more staffing to meet the standards.

In his slide presentation to councillors, Stuebing highlighted that fire service in Halifax was much cheaper than the Canadian average.

The total fire cost per staffed in-service vehicle an hour was $66.37 in 2017/18. The median according to Municipal Benchmarking Network Canada is $318.

Stuebing argued that saving that money means a less effective service. The president of the union representing 500 career firefighters in Halifax said staffing couldn’t be further cut.

“We are as lean … as any fire department in the nation,” Brendan Meagher, president of the Halifax Professional Firefighters Association and a fire captain, told councillors.

Meagher told council an emotional story about a fatal fire in Dartmouth last year from which he estimated more than two dozen people were saved. He said a truck from a station that council voted to staff a few years ago was second on the scene.

“There were people on balconies with flames behind them, and if not for your decision then, outcomes would’ve been different,” he said.

“We ask you to stand with people providing the service and provide the funding.”

Councillor Steve Streatch put a motion forward to consider both the $997,000 in proposed cuts and $363,000 to fund the staffing for the Fall River station in his district, in the budget adjustments list, known to councillors as the parking lot, for consideration later this month.

“These are the folks that are fighting for us every day on many different fronts and I think we owe them every consideration today,” Streatch said.

“We heard clearly that if we want to continue to support the efforts of our fire service, protect public safety and adhere to the standards that this very group has indicated are important to us and our citizens, we have no choice but to add to the parking lot today, and I do so with pride.”

Streatch’s motion passed.

While Halifax Public Libraries wasn’t asked to make cuts as deep as the fire service, its overall budget is much smaller, and the head librarian and CEO argued the impact would be deeply felt.

Åsa Kachan presented her proposed budget of $20,980,000 to the committee on Friday, along with an option to bring it down in line with council’s 1.9 per cent tax increase.

That option would cut $350,000 in staffing costs, equivalent to four to eight positions.

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

Kachan’s presentation slides listed under service impact detailed: “The community would have reduced access to: information services and learning programs, free public use computers and Wi-Fi, programs and spaces that improve literacy, digital literacy and promote social inclusion for all.”

During her presentation, Kachan said staffing is the libraries’ main cost, making up the vast majority of her budget.

Like Halifax Regional Police, the library is governed by a board, which makes decisions on staffing and programming. Council approves its overall budget, but not the details.

“If council lands here, the library board will have some difficult decisions to make,” Kachan told council.

“It’s disheartening because I think one of the things we do at the library is we leverage the municipal investment and we find grants and we find partnerships and we find donors. All of that requires staff and they are of course also the ones that provide a service that has a vital impact on people’s lives.”

Councillor Richard Zurawski argued against cutting those positions, and successfully moved to have the $350,000 added to the budget adjustments list, or the parking lot, as councillors call it.

“We are cutting and cutting and cutting and I don’t think it makes any sense to do that because the library is the hub. It’s a social hub. It’s an intellectual hub. It’s a hub between the generations,” Zurawski said.

Deputy Mayor Tony Mancini said the Dartmouth North Library in his district has had a huge impact on the community and he called the Halifax Central Library “iconic to our municipality,” but he was skeptical of the real impact of the proposed cuts.

“As much as we love the library, we still have to be fiscally responsible,” he said.

“I’d like to understand more … What does that really mean, not having four to eight staff? When a resident walks in the door of the library because we’re short of staff, what does that mean to that resident?”

Kachan said the board would have to discuss exactly which positions would be cut, but the amount, $350,000, is greater than the staffing costs of the library’s smallest three branches.

“That could mean reduced hours. That could mean we may have to cut programs,” she said. “The board has talked about this in a global sense. We have not landed yet on exactly where those cuts would happen.”

The board would analyze service levels and operating hours, but she said the board already feels like hours aren’t long enough to properly serve the community.

“In some respects, it feels like we would be stepping back instead of forward,” she said.

Mancini asked for a briefing note with more specifics before councillors make up their minds.

“It’s very difficult for me to go one way or the other,” Mancini said, “without knowing specifically, what does our resident who goes into a library, whether it’s Sheet Harbour or Dartmouth North or Spryfield, what are they not getting because there’s less bodies?”

Councillors also voted to add $100,000 in funding for food literacy and isolation reduction programs to the budget adjustments list.

They’ll debate the budget adjustments list, which now totals nearly $7 million, on Feb. 28.

Read more about: