Saint John Mayor Don Darling says the city’s 2018 budget, if approved, will be the most difficult it has ever had to pass.
Council is expected to debate and vote on the document Monday that would see police and fire budgets hit by a combined $2.5 million that continues to draw a concerned response from both organizations.
“We can only guess that this will be jobs for our firefighters,” said Peter Alexander, president of the Saint John Firefighters Association. “Whether that translates into cutting off a fire station, usually that’s one in the same.”
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Constable Duane Squires is president of the Saint John Police Association.
“With the slides that were presented to the council, it had mentioned cuts to our traffic department and our community services unit,” he said. “Those are units that directly deal with our community on a daily basis.”
Police and firefighter salaries have been at the forefront of the mayor’s argument.
“We can’t also ignore the fact that 87 to 90 per cent of those budgets are made up of wages so I don’t know how paying someone makes this city safer,” said Darling.
That response is not being well received.
“All employees of the city of Saint John are not supposed to subsidize their own jobs,” argued Alexander. “That has been fought against for over a hundred years”
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The budget document says the protective services budget totals more than $50 million, something the mayor says he has confidence management can deal with effectively.
Those with boots on the ground say they shouldn’t be touched.
“Essential services do not need to be cut,” said Alexander.
“It’s going to change the way that we do business in response to calls,” Squires added.
If Monday’s budget is approved the mayor says it will be the beginning of a three-year plan that will see operational costs cut in city departments by about 12.5 per cent.