REGINA - As day four of Regina’s budget week is ongoing, here are the amendments that have changed the mill rate.
On Monday, the Regina Exhibition Association Ltd. (REAL) came back to city council with a proposed budget decrease ask from $12.7 million to $11.5 million.
While the decrease was substantial, city councillors were still looking for more savings.
On Tuesday, Ward 7 Coun. Shobna Radons put forward an amendment to further reduce REAL’s budget by $300,000 down to approximately $11.2 million.
"Let's face it, the community has a huge concern about REAL. [So], understanding that we do need to make an adjustment, and this does affect our mill rate," said Radons as she addressed her amendment.
Most councillors were in favour of further reducing REAL’s budget. However, REAL interim CEO Roberta Engel warned that they would now be operating at status quo, meaning they would not generate new revenue.
The proposed decrease passed, meaning REAL’s budget so far has gone down by $1.5 million or approximately 0.5 per cent of their original 2.21 per cent mill rate ask.
A small mill rate increase
On Wednesday, Ward 2 Coun. George Tsiklis tabled an amendment where two new full-time staff would be added to support the internal auditor. This would allow the auditor to address the 25-year backlog of required audits.
Adding two full-time staff would cost $215,000 or a 0.07 per cent mill rate increase.
Tsiklis believes adding the staff would help support the auditor while keeping city workers accountable. He noted the city could find millions in savings from this.
For example, Toronto’s auditor general found in 2024, the city spent $11 million on unused and underutilized software licences. The auditor recommended making improvements on oversight licences, which could save on future budgets.
City administration said the only concern with this would be finding staffing to fill these roles, meaning there could be vacant openings while increasing taxes for residents.
Even with this, most of city council voted in favour of the amendment.
Finding future savings
Ward 9 Coun. Jason Mancinelli put forward an amendment on Wednesday for the city to reduce staff operations, specifically out-of-scope management level positions and higher classification and consultant positions, to realize the savings of $1.5 million or a 0.5 mill rate by the end of 2025
Most councillors voted in favour of the amendment.
However, on Thursday, Mayor Chad Bachynski put forward a new amendment, changing the wording of how savings could be found to include other options on top of cutting staffing.
Ward 3 Coun. David Froh showed his displeasure with the original amendment put forward yesterday, calling out city council for choosing to remove the positions of those they work with.
As city manager Niki Anderson said, there are around 40 staff at risk of losing their jobs from this.
Ward 8 Coun. Shanon Zachidniak also called the amendment "short cited," mentioning the city would save less after compensating those who are fired.
After much debate, the amendment was changed to direct city administration to reduce expenditures of at least $1.55 million or a 0.5 per cent mill rate decrease in a report for the April 30th executive committee meeting.
Eventually, city council voted 8-3 to move the amendment forward, with Froh, Victoria Flores (Ward 6), and Zachidniak voting against.
