After a close vote that one councillor said was among the toughest he's faced in five years at city hall, a budget committee voted Thursday to keep the minimum wage for city workers at $14 an hour.

When the Doug Ford government froze the minimum wage at $14 last fall, it meant the city — which had budgeted for a $15 minimum wage — was left to decide what to do with the extra $521,000.

A handful of councillors wanted to go ahead with an increase to $15 an hour, saying it would help support low-income earners in a city struggling to combat poverty.

Others referenced Mayor Ed Holder's speech earlier Thursday, in which he vowed to help London's most vulnerable.

"If we want to prove that talk is more than talk, and that we're willing to take action, we need to do something about poverty," said Coun. Elizabeth Peloza.

​Coun. Michael Van Holst, who voted against moving to $15, said the money could be better spent in other ways.

"This is money we could be putting into housing, into poverty," he said. "Let's leave as much money in the budget to deal with that. Every dollar we spend in one place, we can't spend in another place."

'Most difficult' vote

In the end, a motion to cancel the wage increase passed 9-6 with councillors Arielle Kayabaga, Elizabeth Peloza, Stephen Turner, Mo Salih, Anna Hopkins and Jesse Helmer voting against.

Coun. Josh Morgan, the city's budget chair, voted to hold the minimum wage at $14. After Thursday's meeting, he admitted it was a wrenching decision.

"That's the most difficult vote I've made in my entire time on council," he said. "I could have gone either way with it. For me, it was both the merits of providing that wage increase to the employees using that money in other ways."

The decision will affect about 350 part-time city workers; many of which are students.

Kayabaga said, by voting down the wage increase, council missed a chance to provide support for working Londoners on low incomes.

"If we're going to set the tone of leadership in the city, we should be providing fair, living wages in our city," she said. "I was looking for leadership in that way and but that's OK, we'll try again."

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Other budget priorities

​It was one of a handful of amendments approved by council in a special budget meeting of the strategic priorities and planning committee.

Also approved was a plan to allocate $2-million for the London Children's Museum to help fund the museum's move to a new location in the former Kellogg's plant. The money will come from the Economic Development Committee ($1.5 million) and the city's Tourism Infrastructure Fund $500,000.

The committee also approved money for improved bike lane maintenance ($408,000) and improvements to ambulance service ($590,000).

Council also voted 12-3 to use $330,000 from the assessment growth fund from the previous year to keep the average property tax increase at 2.7 per cent.

Earlier in Thursday's meeting, Coun. Phil Squire put forward a motion that asked staff to look at options for shaving $1.8 million from the budget in a bid to drive down the tax rate increase to 2.4 per cent.

Some councillors said it was too late in the budget process for such as drastic tax cut to be considered.

Coun. Stephen Turner said the cut, which would save the average residential taxpayer about $15, was "more symbolic than significant."

Squire launched into an impassioned defence of his motion, saying the current budget process gives councillors little opportunity to make a meaningful shift in the budget numbers.

Squire's motion failed in a vote of 10-5 (Squire, Van Holst, Morgan, Van Meerbergen and Hillier were in favour).

​Because the committee didn't get through all the budget items, the meeting "recessed" just after 4 p.m. Thursday and will resume on Monday.

The four-year budget is due to receive final council approval in February.