City of Prince Rupert outlines plans for Budget 2024 consultation process

Prince Rupert City Council has moved the timeline forward towards considering their 2024 civic budget, with the process which earlier this year was a Spring event now moved to the fall.

The City's Financial office first indicated of their plan to move the annual consultation process tot he fall back in June, when  CFO Corinne Bombrn outlined the plans in a report to Council.

Changing the timing of the budget process will enable the City and the community to gain certainty of operational service costs for the calendar year earlier than has occurred historically as well as provides for greater opportunities for success in achieving Council’s strategic goals. -- Prince Rupert CFO Corinne Bomben in June 2023

The timeline for the process actually one that began in July, though  the introduction of the Draft Budget set for September hasn't been noted publicly as of yet.

Yesterday,  City Staff provided a thumbnail sketch of the process ahead for the public which will start with a Special City Council Session on November 6th at City Hall.

That will be followed by a November 9th Public Budget Meeting, that to be held at 7PM at Coast Mountain College in their Multi Purpose room, where the public will have opportunity to ask questions related to the proposed spending from civic officials.

There's no indication from the messaging of this week as to why they chose to host the public consultation outside of the city's own facilities; or if they have plans for a live-stream or recording of the event for those that many not be able to make the November 9th session.

The Third and final Budget engagement is to come at the Regular Council Session of November 14th, which will offer one final opportunity for public comment prior to the decision of Council on their financial planning as part of that council session.

The Adoption of the Five Year plan is anticipated to be in place by December.

The City relayed news of their plans through a Social media post on Facebook on Thursday, the event page for the Public Budget event is available here. 

The background towards the event and the shift to fall from Spring is as follows:

click to enlarge

As we did this spring, we'll chart all of the Budget related themes to come out of the process through an archive page, which you can access here.

Our Archive of civic related themes is available here.

A wider overview of past Council Discussion topics  is available here.