Deputy Mayor Mike Ross urged for even more austerity as councillors voted Wednesday night to defer a number of capital projects to increase municipal cashflow.
"The only concern is that we haven't gone far enough," he said. "I think everything should be off the table. Every penny we're about to spend should not be spent. We don't know what the world is going to look like tomorrow."
The deferral of dozens of projects, including the splash pad, Midland Bay Landing, repairs to the town hall, operations, and library services, would provide more than $2.5 million in cashflow to the town.
Ross said that being able to save that amount is great.
"But I think we should come up with $10 million. I think we need to save ourselves and not really rely on someone else to come through and save us," he said referring to the federal and provincial funding, for which staff are seeking updates as more information becomes available with time.
Along with deferring projects, staff also recommended that special events in the community should also be cancelled for 2020.
But that concerned Coun. Carole McGinn.
"I don't think we need to be deferring every event in 2020," she said. "I would prefer if we were doing it quarterly. And if we find that we have flattened the curve, then we're not putting ourselves in a position that people don't apply for events for next year."
Ross said he understood her concern, but he was happy supporting the cancellation of all remaining events for the year.
"I think we need to do this next year," he said. "Anything new is off the table for 2020."
Coun. Bill Gordon said he was interested in finding out if there was more that could be cancelled.
"What else can we cut and save?" he said. "It might be interesting to see what else there is. What are we still going ahead with perhaps we could declare as a want and not need. Or is this the most thought-out list?"
Andy Campbell, director of infrastructure, responded that the list shows a substantial reduction in some of the work planned for this year.
"There are about 30 other projects on the books," he said. "Those are the ones we consider we can't change."
For example, Campbell said, storm-pond maintenance, playground equipment, replacing a snowplow, sidewalk repairs, environmental risk assessments studies, and more are some projects that cannot be deferred or cancelled.
"We can squeeze a few more out but what's left on the list address the safety issues we have to deal with and major assets we have to get to," he said.
Ross said he agrees projects around safety need to go ahead, adding, "When I hear you say we're going to buy new playground equipment, they're not open right now and we don't know if they'll ever be open. That's ideally what we can put off."
He said the municipality needs to focus on preparing for what is to come.
"Every step we take today is going to save us six months from now," said Ross.
While all councillors voted in favour of deferring the list of projects presented by staff, they were requested to bring forward a revised list on June 17.
The decision from last night's committee of the whole will be ratified by council at its next meeting.
