Deep divide emerges as Moncton city council approves 2017 budget

Moncton city council approved its 2017 budget on Monday night, but the controversy over salary raises for the mayor and council continued, with three councillors voting against the new budget.

Councillors Shawn Crossman, Paul Pellerin and Bryan Butler all said they could not vote for abudget that includedabout $100,000 inraises.

"I just could not support the outrageous increase,"Crossmantold Information MorningMonctonon Tuesday.

"It was over $100,000 in cuts to community groups but yet council's raise was equal it was over $100,000. You can't take from the community to give to yourself. I just don't agree with that."

• Moncton council votes in favour of a pay raise, again

The operating budget of almost$150 milliondid not raise the property tax rate, whichremains unchanged at $1.6497 per hundred dollars of assessed value.

But Crossmanargued that Moncton council should have reduced the property tax rate, since overall property assessmentsare up by 3.72 per cent for 2017 and citizens will ultimately still see a sizeable increase in their tax bills.

For a home worth $150,000, that increase in assessment would mean an increase in taxes of about $90.

Deep divide emerges

During Monday night's council meeting, Coun. Butler made a motion to postpone the salaryincrease until 2018 but that was voted down by council.

Meanwhile, Pellerin was successful in preventing user fees for groups such asminor baseball and minor football from going up in 2017.

He made a motion that council use $25,000 from itsreserve fund to prevent that increase and it was approved by council.

Crossman said a deep divide has emerged among council members since he, Pellerin and Butler opposed the salary increases.

"I really don't have a working relationship anymore with a lot of members on council," he said.

Crossman described this divide as an uphill battle for himself and the citizens of Ward 1, as he's now on the outside looking in.

"I was a person who had a different opinion," he said. "They didn't want to listen, they didn't want to hear it, so they just turned their back."

Mayor Dawn Arnold, Deputy Mayor Blair Lawrence and all of the council memberswho voted in favour ofthe budget on Monday night, with the exception of newly elected Susan Edgett, declined requests for an interview from CBC News.

Longtime councillor to challenge pay increase

Former city councilor Brian Hicks, who also ran for mayor in the last election, said the argument that the salary increases will help the city attract morecandidates in the future doesn't make sense.

"If you really believe that you would have made [the salary increase] effective for the next council," he said.

"Basically all they're doing is putting [about 400,000]of our tax dollars in their pockets."

Hicks plans to challenge the salary increases and the process by which it was approved.

"I think taxpayers need to get together here, form a group and keep politicians accountable. This is a pretty nasty little secret deal and I think once we see the e-mail trail people are going to be shocked."

Pellerinmade a request to city staff to ask the provincial minister of local government to look into a series of emails among council members concerning the salary increase.

"I just wanted to make sure that the spirit of [the Municipalities Act]was followed," he said.