Saskatoon council to vote on budget surplus, freeway endorsement

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Saskatoon city council meets Wednesday this week for its March regular business meeting, with final votes expected on a few key issues.

SURPLUS

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Members of council who just a few months ago went through a lengthy, multi-day process to set a budget for 2024 and 2025 will have a much more enviable task at Wednesday’s meeting, as they work out what to do with just under $10 million in surplus funds from the 2023 fiscal year.

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While some residents who face a six per cent property tax hike this year might hope to see any surplus directed toward tax relief, city staff are instead urging council to split the funds between the fiscal stabilization and snow and ice management reserve funds.

Both reserve funds have been drawn down heavily in recent years due to heavy snowstorms and the financial fallout caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

While advocating for replenishing the reserves, chief financial officer Clae Hack late last month noted that the city already appeared likely to go over its snow and ice management budget for 2024. Hack made the prediction the day before the city was inundated with some 25 centimetres of snow over the first weekend of March, necessitating a citywide emergency cleanup operation to make streets passable for residents and emergency services.

The 2023 budget surplus was largely fuelled by lower-than-anticipated snowfall in the latter part of the year, and higher Saskatoon Transit ridership, which has been linked to the arrival of more than 14,000 new people to the city last year.

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FREEWAY

The provincial government is asking city council to support a proposed alignment for the second phase of a functional planning study for what’s come to be known as the Saskatoon Freeway.

The project, in the works since 1999,  is meant to create a 55-kilometre stretch of four-lane highway running from Highway 11 south of the city and looping east and north to connect with Highway 7 west of Saskatoon.

All told, the project is expected to require 16 interchanges, five railway overpasses, at least two flyovers and one major river crossing.

Council in April 2022 endorsed Phase 1 of the study, which deals with the proposed bypass route between Highway 16 northwest of Saskatoon east to the South Saskatchewan River.

Phase 2 of the functional planning study addresses the bypass route between the river and Highway 11 south of the city limit.

The proposed routing has drawn significant opposition from groups concerned about protecting the ecologically sensitive Northeast Swale and Small Swale areas. Provincial officials have previously indicated that more environmental assessment work will be done, including the development of recommendations on how to mitigate potential environmental harms.

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While environmental groups are seeking to block or alter the project, council also faces pressure to sign off on the proposed alignment, because getting the bypass route more precisely pinned down will free up land currently being held for development, giving some certainty to affected landowners in the region and allowing staff in Saskatoon and neighbouring cities, towns and First Nations to proceed with land use and transportation planning for their respective communities.

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