Some Federal Budget Items

Here are some points regarding the Federal Budget and how it may effect Kindersley and other municipalities.

• Good news: the federal government is committing to new, long-term, predictable, and stable infrastructure funding for municipalities.
• Revenues for municipalities from the Gas Tax Fund are to be indexed to inflation ensuring predictable and stable funding.
• Smaller communities with populations less than 100,000 like Kindersley will now have access to a dedicated Small Communities Fund of $1 billion.
• The new Building Canada Fund is for ten years.
• Currently municipalities own and operate approximately 66% of the infrastructure across Canada.
• The infrastructure deficit across Canada is been calculated to be approximately $172 billion.
• I am concerned municipalities are being tasked to carry more infrastructure costs despite having less revenue streams than other levels of government.
• There is still too much uncertainty regarding the Federal Government's P3 process for small communities like Kindersley.
• The Federal Government needs to provide more details regarding the allocation and distribution of funds for infrastructure.
• The Federal Government is only allocating $210 million for infrastructure this year. This is significant underfunding of our and other municipalities needs.