Wednesday morning and our FD budget saga

Early this morning I checked the agenda package for Thursday night's board meeting, when they will be adopting the budget. I had not heard a response from Merrick, and was anxious to know what was happening or might happen with our FD budget.

Here's the email I sent him this morning at 8:45:

Hello Merrick,

On checking the agenda package for Thursday evening's PRRD board meeting (https://powellriverregionaldistrict.civicweb.net/filepro/documents/58397...)
I see that in item 10.3 Financial Plan Memo (https://powellriverregionaldistrict.civicweb.net/document/61795/BL516%20...) on page 2, that the tax increase for Electoral Area E over 2016 is to be 19.42%    That is clearly unacceptable and does not comply even with what you reported last night through the email list.

From Financial Plan Appendix A (https://powellriverregionaldistrict.civicweb.net/document/61796/BL516%20...) on page 4, I see that the budget for Lasqueti Fire Protection is set to be $139,548.

From Financial Plan Appendix B (https://powellriverregionaldistrict.civicweb.net/document/61797/BL516%20...) on page 86 through 88 (thought the table of contents says it's on page 44) I see that the budget includes (p86) $35,000 for communications, and $11,795 for the reserve (for SCBA and fire trucks). Page 87 says the total budget is to be $144,064 a 24% increase over 2016.

This appears to be the version that you said you had prepared with Linda Greenan, to reduce the tax increasee to 20%.  It's not anything like what you said you'd do yesterday, or like you reported last night in the email list.

Please, find out immediately and let me know what the detailed budget that will be discussed and decided on for Lasqueti Fire Protection is to be.

Thank you,   Peter

I just received this response, that he sent me at 10:10am:

Hi Peter, I wrote a letter to the Board yesterday that will be read in the correspondence section of the meeting, when 2 resolutions will be moved actuating the reductions I reported yesterday. As for your queries late last evening, the 5.7% increase reflects the whole budget including the Hospital Board budget. Hope this helps, for more detailed mathematical analysis please call Linda Greenan in PR. Merrick

I sent this email to Linda Greenan, with copies to Merrick and Al Radke:

Hello Linda,

Yesterday afternoon Merrick met with alternate director Laurence Fisher, fire chief Richard Carlson and me. He told us told us that the transfer to reserves ($26,306) would be cut, and the budget for communications would be reduced from $40,000 to $15,000. That's a total of $51,306.  The total budget for 2017 as proposed was to be $158,554. Cutting $51,306 from this leaves a budget of $107,248.

Yesterday evening he submitted a notice to the Lasqueti email list saying that he had made these cuts, and that the budget was now 2.2% more than in 2016, and that our total PRRD taxes would be going up 5.7%

I emailed and telephoned him last night, because his statement to us in the afternoon would result in a near 10% reduction in the fire department budget from 2016, though still approximately $10,000 more than we spent last year.

He could not explain how this might be, and told me that he has never bothered about the nitpicky details of the budget. The numbers he reported in his email to the Lasqueti community came from Al Radke, he told me, and he would call the office this morning and find out. I asked him to send me, or have you send me, the detailed budget and financial plan for our fire department.

I just got this email from him, sent to me a little more than an hour ago:
 

Hi Peter, I wrote a letter to the Board yesterday that will be read in the correspondence section of the meeting, when 2 resolutions will be moved actuating the reductions I reported yesterday. As for your queries late last evening, the 5.7% increase reflects the whole budget including the Hospital Board budget. Hope this helps, for more detailed mathematical analysis please call Linda Greenan in PR. Merrick

This, to me, is evidence of either incompetence or dereliction of duty from our regional director. It is his job to know what is going on, or to find out, and also to inform his community and to listen to them. He has done none of these things, and is carrying on doing none of them.

Please would you let me know, as soon as possible, what proposed budget for the Lasqueti fire department will be considered by the board Thursday evening.

Laurence and RIchard and I trusted Merrick when he told us he would be making the cuts he said. On the phone last night, he told me that he was making even further cuts, in consultation with Mr. Radke - further decreasing the communications budget to $11,000 and reducing the total by a further $4,000.

This doesn't square at all with a 2.2% increase in the budget, unless some significant numbers have been added. I don't understand, and he is unwilling or unable to explain.

I would greatly appreciate if you would email me the page of the budget and/or financial plan that tells what the board will be considering Thursday evening.

If it is easier for you, you can reach me by telephone at 250-333-8785.  I will not be in the house by the telephone all day, and I will be away from home from about 2:30 until 6 or so, but I will check my messages and can call you back if you leave me your telephone number.

Thank you very much.  I appreciate how much extra work this has all been for you, and apologize that it has all come a the end of what should have been a long process. Unfortunately, we have had to discover what's going on, and have had to deal with our recalcitrant representative in the last few meetings.

Peter Johnston
Lasqueti Island
250-333-8785