City staff are busy keeping track of costs for what the city believes is a downloading to municipalities by senior levels of government.
At the Dec. 3, 2024 council meeting, Williams Lake city council took a page from a report sent by the City of Kamloops on the financial impacts of higher-level government policy change.
Williams Lake city council directed staff to compile quarterly reports for 2025 identifying these costs to this city for services they believe are being downloaded by senior levels of government.
While the report by Kim Dressler, manager of administrative services, acknowledges the issue of downloading costs to local governments is not new, the report states that inflation, the pandemic and trade conflicts, etc., have made it an increasing problem.
So staff compiled an initial report of an estimate of downloaded costs to the city for the first quarter of 2025, and presented the report to council at the May 6, 2025 council meeting.
Items like an increased need for security in the Cariboo Memorial Complex, work to keep parks and public washrooms clean, increased requirements for emergency and disaster management, and filling service gaps for the unhoused in the community were costed out. The city estimates service gaps for the unhoused populations at $23,800 in the first three months of 2025.
Other costs the city attributes to downloading from senior levels of government are additional costs associated with RCMP like body worn cameras and a general investigations section and requirements for hazard risk mapping and updating their emergency plan required by policy changes at the provincial and federal government levels.
The update to the city's emergency plan was funded by an $80,000 grant. However the report states staff costs associated with the updates to emergency management for the city amount to an estimated additional $12,000 in the first quarter.
The city is estimating a total of $122,800 in additional costs are falling on municipal resources in the first three months of 2025. They plan to send their documented costs to the regional MP, MLA, and fellow municipal governments and invoice the senior levels of government for these costs.
In an emailed response to the Tribune regarding the report, the B.C. Minister of Housing and Municipal Affairs (HMA), Ravi Kahlon said municipalities are "critical partners in building healthy and economically vibrant neighbourhoods."
“Our shared success depends on strong collaboration at every level of government," stated Kahlon, pointing out the contributions the province is making towards local infrastructure and services.
"We have stepped up with supports like the Growing Communities Fund and expanded financing tools for local governments to invest in local infrastructure,” he wrote in an emailed statement.
At the May 6 council meeting, council expressed their amazement at some of the amounts in the report.
"These costs are starting to be extraordinarily steep," said Coun. Scott Nelson.
"Reading through that report was shocking at best," said Coun. Jazmyn Lyons. "It's very disturbing when you see what the burden falling on our taxpayers is."
"There's only one taxpayer," said Mayor Surinderpal Rathor, adding municipal taxpayers may not be aware of the extra costs falling on cities, but hopefully this will help draw attention to the issue.
He said on social media, people are jumping on city council, without being aware of the additional strain being put on local governments due to this downloading of services.
The Ministry of Housing and Municipal Affairs (HMA) said the province shares the city's concerns around increased costs resulting from weather events and federal regulatory requirements. The ministry said these issues are being worked on with the Union of British Columbia Municipalities. The ministry also said it is lobbying on behalf of both the province and local governments for more federal funding for infrastructure upgrades related to federal regulations.
HMA also said Williams Lake has so far received $3,728,000 from the Growing Communities Fund and pointed out a number of expanded development finance tools local governments can use to support municipal portions of development costs.
The ministry said they are "committed to open, honest conversations with local governments about their finance systems."
