One of the topics of discussion in the midst of Saskatoon budget deliberations has been revolving around city staffing.
Chief Financial Officer Clae Hack said Saskatoon has about 4,300 full-time equivalent positions (FTEs), but said it’s difficult to make apples to apples comparisons with similar sized cities.
“That includes everything from utilities, to road maintenance, transit services, and everywhere in between,” Hack said.
The city is facing a $52.4-million funding shortage next year, followed by a $23.2-million gap in 2025, which has been equated to a 18.56-per cent property tax increase in 2024, and a 6.95-per cent property tax increase the following year.
Hack compared Saskatoon to Regina, noting the Queen City reports about 3,000 FTEs, but says there’s more to it.
“It’s really important to dive into the context behind that, so when Regina reports out their FTEs from their public budget documents that includes civic services and police services. It doesn’t include things like utilities.”
Saskatoon operates over 70 different business lines, and one FTE position can account for five part-time workers.
He said another consideration is Saskatoon’s land development branch, which requires FTEs to staff it, but also brings in revenue for the city.
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Hack added that many municipalities may not run the same services as Saskatoon, giving examples like Saskatoon running its own power utility, or having its own water and wastewater operations, where other municipalities might contract those services out.
Out of the 4,300 FTEs in Saskatoon, Hack said only about 3,000 of them are tax supported.
Hack said when they account for differences among similar cities they have an FTE count per capita that is on par or lower than other municipalities.
He noted that a report will be coming out in the coming months diving deeper into FTE positions within the city.
Coun. Darren Hill said the city has a high number of FTEs and that they need to be looking at that more closely.
“What we need to be looking at it is the total number in relation to the work that they are doing in each of their individual business lines,” Hill said.
He said those numbers also don’t account for roughly 350 temporary contract workers, some of which he said have been there for eight years or more.
“I don’t know why we’re not calling them a full-time employee, they are acting like a full-time employee and getting paid like a full-time employee.”
He said even if some of those staff aren’t being supported by property taxes, they are still being supported through user fees.
“No matter how you demonstrate it, it’s still the same people paying for those employees.”
Hill said he wants to see an overhaul of those employees and reduce that number by at least 10 per cent.
He said this is something that hasn’t happened in his 17 years on council, but said he’d like to see an independent review of all the FTEs in the city.
“I think most of our cuts should come from middle management and upper management. Leave the front-line workers alone.”
Hill said front-line workers are the ones performing the core services in the city.
“We’ll never get that funding gap addressed if we don’t cut staff.”
Hill said there’s not a revenue problem in Saskatoon, but there is a spending problem.
“We spend more than we bring in. You can’t run your household like that, we shouldn’t be running the city like that.”
Hill said he’s hoping to table an independent review at the next city council meeting, but he’s not certain he’ll get anywhere.
Follow-up meetings around budget discussions are going to be held July 25 and Aug. 15.
Hill said he’s not confident they’ll be able to make the cuts he feels needs to happen in the city.
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