Four years ago, when Flin Flon voters hired a new mayor and three new city councillors, it was clear municipal politics were headed in a fresh
direction.
But I don’t think anyone knew at the time just how different this group of elected officials
would be.
I have said it before and I’ll say it again: even if you differ with the politics and policies of Mayor George Fontaine and his council, you have to give them full marks for boldness.
One example is their special services levy. This council (well, most members of it) came to believe that low-end homes (think North Avenue and Hapnot Street) pay too little tax compared to their high-end counterparts (think Dadson Row and Roche Boulevard).
So, with the Manitoba government refusing to follow Saskatchewan’s lead and allow a base tax, council essentially did an end run and devised a complex and controversial fee that would at least partially lessen the tax gap.
Despite my own misgivings about the levy and its potential impact on low-income homeowners, I admit the levy is a sign of tactical brilliance. And for what it’s worth, I am told other Manitoba municipalities are now looking into replicating it.
Council also displayed boldness on the issue of fire protection for surrounding cottage
subdivisions.
Many Flin Flonners saw no reason to continue subsidizing fire service for outside jurisdictions on what amounted to a goodwill basis.
So council, after unsuccessfully offering to continue the service for $300 per cottage, pulled the plug. The savings to the city may not have been significant, but the point being made was.
Unfortunately, subsequent conversations between the city and cottagers have fuelled division over whether cabin owners are really “Flin Flonners.”
It’s fair to say that most cottagers – or at least those who are most engaged – have little interest in further talks with the city for fire protection or any other service.
That means the next council must decide what to do with the current council’s mention of the A word – annexation – as a possible tool to derive revenue from people who live near Flin Flon but have chosen not to be literal Flin Flonners.
Personally (and don’t think of me as an expert on the subject), I have always seen annexation of cottage country as a pipe dream.
That the provincial government would allow the city to make lakefront homes 20-plus minutes away part of Flin Flon seems highly doubtful.
If a three-bedroom home in Flin Flon can be assessed at $135,000, as I’ve seen, one can only imagine what a large, luxurious lakefront house would be worth if it was within newfangled city limits.
More importantly, however, the taxes on such a house would be so unimaginably high that, as sure as there’s a stack in the sky, those homeowners – new Flin Flonners, as it were – would be priced out of their residences.
Would the provincial government open up that can of worms just to help Flin Flon? Probably not.
What’s clear moving forward is that our next mayor and council will need to continue to employ bold thinking – not necessarily the same bold thinking of the last four years, mind you – to meet the challenges of running an efficient municipality in a community where many residents feel taxed out.
Ahead of the Oct. 22 election, we should all take time to hear what the candidates have to say. And we should cast our ballots based not on emotion, or whether we know or like a candidate, but based on who will genuinely bring the best, most practical approaches to the table.
Flin Flon, the choice is yours.
Local Angle runs Fridays.
