Compiled by Lee Harding, Sask. Director, Canadian Taxpayers Federation
The village of Invermay declared a one-time civic holiday on August 22 in celebration of its 100th anniversary. However, this meant an unanticipated problem for the Sunrise Health Region. Under its collective bargaining agreement, all 42 employees of the Invermay Health Centre region must be paid as if it were a statutory holiday. The additional cost is estimated at $8,000.
It's not the only surprise expense for the region. A $12,000 dishwasher was bought at Canora Hospital because an employee couldn't use the low-temperature dishwasher. Allan Daedlick, a VP for the health region was quoted in Yorkton This Week saying the replacement was necessary "because an employee was allergic to items in it. That was driven by Occupational Health and Safety."
A housing project that took $3 million from provincial and federal coffers has closed up just a year and a half after it began. The Dene Empowerment Centre in La Loche was an affordable housing project funded by the National Homelessness Initiative, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp., Northern Village of La Loche, Methy Construction and Maintenance Corporation, and others. On June 18, tenants received notice that the centre would be shut down and residents had to leave by August 31. A source quoted in the Northern Pride said the facility was no longer providing shelter for the needy and that substance abuse and late rent plagued the centre since it began.
The Good Spirit School Division (GSSD) supports the Canadian Taxpayers Federation's position that the province eliminate school property tax rebates for schools by funding schools enough that such rebates aren't necessary. At a recent meeting of trustees, superintendent Sherry Todosichuk said that administering the rebates is a headache for bookkeepers and managers. She was quoted in the Melville Advance saying, "It's a lot of extra paperwork for municipalities and us to issue it."
In addition, the board of the Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities announced that property taxpayers should pay no more than 10 percent of the cost of running schools. Currently, it's about 50 percent.
Four million Canadians had no family doctor in 2008, partly because federal and provincial governments intentionally reduced the numbers of doctors trained in the early 1990s and kept the numbers low until recently. The reason, as Lorne Gunter has put it, was to keep medical costs low and "save the system" at the expense of those it was intended to serve. The Maple Creek News-Times reports that the average Saskatchewan doctor makes $234,600, the fourth-highest rank in Canada, and less than the $264,000 average in Saskatchewan rural areas.
Ituna's town council knows how to barter. The town office had deteriorated so badly it couldn't get insurance, and replacement costs were about the same as repairs. Last October, tenders for a new building ranged from $700,000 to $826,616. That wasn't good enough for town council, who got the architect to design something more affordable. The only bidder this time came in at $583,577. Despite rising construction costs of 2% per month, council managed to negotiate a final cost of $513,892.
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