Mayor Al MacNevin hopes 2015 bill will shed light on unknown costs
ONTARIO—Northeast Town Mayor Al MacNevin hoped that the regional meeting he attended last week in Sudbury on the new Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) billing model would provide more detailed information on what the exact financial ramifications of the new model would mean for his municipality, however he said he and other municipal leaders across the province will have to wait for their 2015 bill for those answers.
“We didn’t get a lot of new information,” Mayor MacNevin told The Expositor following the meeting. “We thought we would get a clearer idea on what the new 60/40 model would mean for us, but that wasn’t the case.”
The new model will take effect January 1, 2015 and includes two components: base policing costs such as crime prevention, proactive policing, officer training and administrative duties, which will account for 60 percent of the overall bill, and costs for reactive calls for service, which will account for approximately 40 percent.
“Previously our base cost per household was $470, but under the new model it should be around $207,” explained Mayor MacNevin. “So we should be seeing a drop on that portion of the bill, but as for the 40 percent occurrences, we aren’t sure how that will affect our bill.”
“Previously, bills were based 100 percent on occurrence, and we have a lot more than other municipalities (on Manitoulin),” continued Mayor MacNevin. “Before there were only two types of occurrences—non serious and serious—which ranged from two (billable) hours to six hours, but now there will be over 110 different types of occurrences and they will range from three (billable) hours to 17 hours, depending on how serious the offence. We don’t have the details on our past occurrences, so we aren’t sure what this change will mean for the Northeast Town. You can’t predict the 40 percent, we assume it will be lower, but we don’t know.”
Mayor MacNevin said that the municipality, along with the rest of Ontario’s municipalities, should be receiving their 2015 OPP bill this upcoming Monday, September 15.
“The only way we really know how much we will be paying is when we see the bill next week,” added the mayor. “Even if we do go down, which we hope we will because they are phasing the changes in over five years, we will only see an $18 drop per household each year.” Municipalities seeing an increase will see a jump of $40 maximum per household each year.
“As I said, I guess we will all just have to wait and see until we get our bills,” concluded Mayor MacNevin.
