Politicians have more questions than answers when it comes to proposed change to police services funding model

  1. Municipal politicians from all over the province are home following last week’s Rural Municipalities of Alberta Conference. Carolyn Kolebaba, Reeve of Northern Sunrise County, was among those in attendance. A hot topic for Kolebaba and others was the province’s proposed changes to the police services funding model. Currently, communities with populations under 5,000 people have policing costs funded by the provincial government. Under a new proposal being discussed, it includes a formula based on 70 percent of a municipality’s equalized assessment and 30 percent would be based on population.

Kolebaba says she had a chance to discuss the county’s concerns with officials in charge of police services. “For areas of populations under 5,000, if we are going to pay for policing, we have thoughts on how that should work,” says Kolebaba. “If we are going to pay it, then we would like a service that is equivalent or close to urban settings where they have the detachments.”

Kolebaba says more questions remain about the proposed model. “They did take our questions and they are going to send us a letter back so we look forward to that. It’s an unknown for us. For most of the municipalities under the population of 5,000 and financially, we are all preparing our budgets right now and we want to know the final formula, if any.”

She also mentions that all politicians are feeling the economic crunch now. “The members are feeling the pinch of the agricultural and oil and gas sector right now and they are a little hesitant moving forward on where all this money is supposed to come from that will contribute to our levels a service.”

To learn more about how equalized assessments work, click here.

– Kenny Trenton, Trending 55 Newsroom