Mayor Cynthia Block breaks down Saskatoon’s budget with Evan Bray

After finalizing the city’s budget for 2025, which includes a 4.96 per cent property tax hike, Saskatoon Mayor Cynthia Block joined the Evan Bray Show on Wednesday morning. The conversation covered the tax increase, Block’s plans for the future, and the power outage that snarled traffic across the city on Tuesday afternoon.

Listen to the full interview, or read the transcript below:

The following transcript has been edited for clarity.

You set aside three days for budget deliberations. You did it in a day and a half. That seems pretty quick and efficient. Why? How did things go, and was it a smooth transition?

BLOCK: I mean, I think it was, but in fairness we always put aside three days for budget. And this was the second of a two-year, multi-year budget, and so a lot of the questions and answers and scrutiny around that budget has been done a year ago, and so this was an opportunity to review and make any tweaks or changes. And also, you know, put another set of eyes on it, with many new council members who have joined our city council. And for the most part, I think that that scrutiny upheld, and I was very pleased to see the whole process go quite smoothly.

The end result for taxpayers ended up being better than what was forecasted. That’s going to feel pretty good coming in at under five per cent when, at one time, it looked as though the property tax increase was going to be closer to six.

BLOCK: Yeah, and there was a there were a few calculations in that, like any budget. You know, you might have favorable balance on on one side, and it might be an unfavorable balance on on another item, but overall, those pieces actually helped improve the overall metrics of the budget. But there are also some decisions to make in terms of perhaps delaying some things so that we could get to a property tax number that was more in line with what we are hearing residents asking us for and, of course, they always would like our taxes to be lower, but I think that foundationally, what made me proud was that we were able to bring down the budget, but at the same time make sure our core services and asset management is strong.

What would be the highlights of this budget package?

BLOCK: Well, I think that the pieces that we were able to achieve, that residents will notice, will be improved snow and ice service. We don’t have a metric for going directly into neighborhoods other than for emergencies. This will at least start to allow us to do some more work inside neighborhoods. We’ll be able to add more community safety resources around Fairhaven, both to the poor people who are unhoused, and for their neighbors. We will be adding a civic contribution in order to achieve at least 30 new police officers in Saskatoon. This is also a piece that was really badly needed. Very grateful to the province for funding those officers, but also we need to make sure that our city is going to be on the side where it’s on the operational side for uniforms, equipment, vehicles and that type of thing. So the pieces that that were really focused in this election campaign, which was homelessness, community safety and affordability, were all addressed in this budget. So I’m pretty proud that we were able to achieve where we arrived yesterday.

Let’s talk about snow removal for a second, mayor, because of course with that first big dump of snow it was very topical. And I’m sure you heard from – whether it was phone calls, emails or just talking to citizens in the city – some people had some frustrations with snow removal, and I feel like the way city snow removal budgets are done, it’s a calendar year, so whatever happens in the winter months in the early part of the calendar year have implications on that big first snowfall if it comes towards the end of the year. Do we need to re-look at that, or do we need to think about budgeting differently when it comes to snow in general?

BLOCK: We continue to re evaluate a few years ago, we introduced an emergency snow response, and that was even because of the type of snow that we received, how quickly it arrived, even the overall amount was overwhelming and it was dangerous, and so we made the decision to make sure all of that snow was removed from every neighborhood in our city. And I think we learned a lot of lessons from that, in terms of what is an emergency and what is not. And the really hard piece – this is from my experience – is that you start out strong and it’s really, really super important, and still takes at least eight weeks to do that job. And it wouldn’t matter what kind of all-points bulletin you put out across western Canada, you would not be able to get the resources you need to be able to do it faster than that. And so by the time you’re into the sixth week, people are wondering, well, why are you in my neighborhood now? It was melting. It’s spring. I think that we need to find a way to have a level of service that is, “yes, let’s do our priority streets,” which we get strong kudos for that, and we should, because our team is really strong and they get out there and do those priority roads very quickly and around school zones. But I think when we go into residential neighborhoods, we need to have an intermediate plan where we can have more flexibility in how and when we go in. And that’s what this additional money for our snow and ice budget is designed to do, is to give us a bit more flexibility with the rut shaving and making sure that it’s smooth, so safety (is) number one. But sometimes that rutting can get so bad that it’s also not very safe either. So I think it’s important that we sort of balance those things out. Sorry, I meant to mention that when we do go into neighborhoods and haul it all that snow, that cost is close to $20 million, and the next day it might snow again. So we’re always trying to find that balance between saving taxpayers money and making sure that we are definitely engaging in what we need to do to keep people safe.

I know on Monday, you heard from different delegations either defending their ask in the budget or maybe making some asks of you and the rest of council. TCU Place CEO Tammy Sweeney talked about the venue needing to rethink its model, noting it’s facing over a $500,000 deficit in 2025. Does that cause you to pause and think about what the (downtown event and entertainment district) is going to look like? Is there a concern that if TCU Place is facing this deficit, that that could translate to problems for the (proposed downtown arena) down the road?

BLOCK: I really don’t think those two things are connected. Their business model is actually very sound, but they have not had a subsidy increase in decades, and they managed to make it through COVID without asking city council for any money. So they’ve been using reserves, and they’ve been prudently making sure they are managing their budgets effectively and attracting, you know, some really wonderful talent for our for our residents to be able to enjoy, and for visitors, and also being able to attract some very important work for the trade and convention side. But like SaskTel Centre, TCU, is facing the law of diminishing returns in terms of revenues, and that’s because, based on what is expected of those kinds of facilities today, we have what they would describe as aging infrastructure and an overall setup that is not going to be sustainable in the long run. So what we need to do is do the best we can to continue to provide the wonderful services that TCU provides for our city and for visitors, but also look to the to the horizon. What do we need to keep planning for over the next decade or so to ensure that we are going to continue to be competitive with other cities in our market size? And so that’s what (downtown event and entertainment district) is all about. It’s not about pushing forward with a big infrastructure plan – it’s about carefully planning and ensuring that we are planning for the future and for (the) next generation.

Another group that you heard from was the North Saskatoon Business Association. They called for an audit or a review of staffing. You’ve been on council now for a while. Is that something that’s needed?

BLOCK: This is actually already in the works, and I’ve had the opportunity to speak to the NSBA about this. I actually chaired the audit and finance committee for quite some time in this past term, and I think what will be helpful with having a value-for-money audit is that rather than you know, getting into the operations and having you know, political people or business people deciding which job goes, we should be understanding whether the folks that are hired are actually adding the value that we need to efficiently deliver services to our city and to our residents. So I will be looking very much forward to that. We have a new city auditor. That auditor is independent, so it literally works for the finance committee, so I think that that will be a really wonderful opportunity for the NSBA and others in the business community to work with us to ensure those terms of reference are going to help to achieve the outcomes that we all are seeking.

I’m assuming you’ve heard those concerns before. I know Mayor Charlie Clark had faced those, those criticisms about a robust city hall staff, and often they would compare it to city hall in Regina, which I know is not exactly apples to apples, but you see this new this process that’s ongoing, this new auditor, as an opportunity to quell some of those concerns?

BLOCK: Absolutely, and you’re absolutely right, Evan. It’s not apples to apples. I mean, Saskatoon has a land bank. We run our own power utility. There are just so many things that you just can’t compare directly. But I do know that when we calculate those, and you take a look at how we stack up against other cities of our size across Canada, or even larger ones, those workers, you know, based on population, have continuously gone down since 2016.

You brought up power. Yesterday a little bit of of a problem, and I know it caused some concerns, but everything ironed out OK there, correct?

BLOCK: It did. In fact, I just got an update on that this morning, so they don’t have a complete solution at this point, but it is not a systemic issue. It looks like there was a failed switch, and that would be more like a big version of a breaker switch in your own house. And we’ll keep working at that.

You’ve got a few weeks under your belt now, and a budget. How is this new council working together? Have early indications been it’s it’s a different look than what you would have seen with the last council?

BLOCK: We’re still getting to know each other, but we have spent a lot of time together over the last couple of weeks. I think the thing that really stood out for me, especially as we were going into budget, which is like drinking out of a fire hose if you never done it before, is just how much the veteran counselors supported the new counselors – helped them to understand how and why things work the way they do. What were the kinds of decisions that were made in the indicative budget last year that can help them put their own lens on it for this year, and just how much the new councilors were able to ask really important questions to help all of us better understand the decisions we were making over those last couple of days. So I’m I’m encouraged and optimistic and very grateful for a council that is working well together.