City council approved the early workings of a new bylaw to allow borrowing of funds for major projects. (File photo/meadowlakeNOW Staff)

By meadowlakeNOW Staff

Payment time

Meadow Lake working on borrowing bylaw

Jun 17, 2022 | 2:21 PM

The City of Meadow Lake approved the first reading of a new bylaw to allow for borrowing funds and incurring long-term debt to finance major projects.

This comes as the city needs to borrow $2.5 million for a pair of significant financial obligations; $1.6 million for the Long term Care Facility (LTC) commitment and $900,000 for the Disaster Mitigation and Adaptation Fund (DMAF) Project.

“We’ve committed to covering 20 per cent of the care facility’s costs and we’re starting to have to pay share,” Mayor Merlin Seymour told meadowlakeNOW.

LTC Loan biannual installments of $208,386.02 will come from the LTC Levies collected from residents, while the DMAF payments are $117,217.14 and a part of the operating budget expenses that are funded through normal revenue streams.

This will be dependent on selecting a lender to provide the capital financing. Once a contract is awarded, a draft of the bylaw will be submitted to the selected proponent.

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Seymour said this is important to avoid financial obstacles for Meadow Lake.

“Just so the city doesn’t become cash strapped, we had to tender out the ability to borrow some money for those two projects,” he said.

If needed, staff will amend the borrowing bylaw to indicate the approved rate and payment amounts.

Seymour added that they’ve continued to talk to the Saskatchewan Health Authority about the long-term care facility, which they hope will be ready for use soon.

“Assuming that all the work is completed within the next six weeks, we’ll be moving in and beginning operations,” he said.

The city is also continuing communications with Northwest School Division in regards to a request for partnership on the potential joint-use facility. Staff are asking for specifics of the accommodations the city would need to make, how partnering on design, construction and continued operations would look and references for contacts in other communities where this has been done successfully. They are also looking for letters of support from the community at large to guage the level of local support for such a partnership.

Seymour said no decision will be made until that sort of information is gathered.

“There’s no capital or anything proposed for it yet, since our budget is in place already,” he said. “But we need to have further discussions about what we feel is best for the community as a whole.”

The city is also working on developing a governance framework for annual projects. This requires community engagement to determine best communications outlets, specifically determining how residents wish to be communicated to. This is set for completion by the end of the year.

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cjnbnews@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter: @meadowlakeNOW