OLDS — The town is currently looking at a deficit of about $320,000 by the end of the year, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, finance director Sheena Linderman says.
But that doesn’t necessarily mean residents can expect tax hikes or other action to cover that loss.
During a presentation to town council earlier this month, Linderman said the town usually runs a surplus, “so I still don’t anticipate us being in a deficit situation.”
In addition, she said there are many areas in the operating budget that were not included in her presentation, so savings could be found there.
As a result, she said, “it’s so hard to know where they will sit at the end of the year.”
Linderman said currently, the town expects to lose about $624,100 in revenue by the end of December due to COVID-related impacts.
On the other hand, she said so far the town expects to realize about $305,830 in savings due to COVID-related restrictions.
Chief administrative officer Michael Merritt called Linderman’s assessment “ a great explanation.”
“I think it’s amazing that we are only facing a deficit right now of (about) $300,000 with the unknowns that we had to face immediately and how we had to adjust staffing issues.
“We were very quick to look at finding expenses that we would not basically have to incur and to keep some vacancies for a longer period of time and maybe as director Linderman said, till the end of the year in some cases.
“So I do think that we will have a chance to possibly make up that difference. But even if not, we have basically, I think, wrestled the issue,” he said.
Merritt noted the town could also dip into reserves to “adjust this item as well.”
Deputy Mayor Mitch Thomson thanked Merritt and other town staff for “every effort that staff takes to manage those costs and try to keep us on the right side of the balance.”
Coun. Mary Anne Overwater pointed out the town’s losses may not be as large as anticipated if it receives more funding from the provincial government.
“I think we’ve done a great job in monitoring our expenses and looking after our community as well as we did, considering we had very few cases and our cases are all recovered of the few that we had,” she said.
“So kudos to everybody who was involved in keeping our community safe.”
