City council will ask London homeowners to dig deeper into their pockets next year, $99 deeper.
But it could have been worse, with the draft 2019 city budget unveiled Monday afternoon coming in below initial estimates.
This is the final update to the city’s 2016 to 2019 multi-year budget.
It recommends the tax rate rise 2.7 per cent, which works out to about $74 more on the average home.
Original estimates predicted a 3.2 per cent increase.
But the province eliminating the minimum wage increase will save the city $521,000 in 2019 and another $2M will be saved through confidential cost reductions.
Among the budget pressures forcing tax rate up are ambulance costs rising $590,000 and bike lane maintenance coming in at $408,000.
Water and sewer rates are recommended to climb three per cent, or $11 and $14 more next year.
In total that’s $99 more next year for the average London homeowner.
Londoners will have several opportunities to weigh in on the draft budget in January.
There is a budget open house on Jan. 8th from 6-8 p.m. at the BMO Centre and a public participation meeting on Jan. 17th at 4 p.m. at city hall.
Council will seek to find more savings before finalizing the budget Feb. 12th.
