Local Government Minister Jeff Carr speaks to reporters after council endorsed his financial sustainability report.
After tabling a much awaited financial sustainability report last month, Saint John council has decided to accept the three-part action plan.
Tensions were still high around the horseshoe, with many councillors feeling the document doesn’t offer enough concrete help to dig the city out of a financial hole.
The report was passed with a number of reservations and conditions, with many skeptical that the plan will actually work.
Many others say they simply want to move on.
City Manager John Collin says the city is better off with an endorsed report, than without it entirely, but urges that those reservations continue to be voiced in order to make the plan better.
Mayor Don Darling says the work will be hard, but the city is ready to start making big changes.
“With the endorsement of this plan tonight we have a big challenge ahead of us. We are going to have big impacts to the community in Saint John, but we’re going to roll our sleeves up, we’re going to get at the deficit, and we’re going to wrestle that beast to the ground,” he said in an interview.
Darling says he wishes the document was more action driven offered more concrete help, and more detailed time lines.
“We set out to meet a goal, this report didn’t meet it,” he said.
Last week, members of council, several MLA’s and Premier Blaine Higgs, met to discuss the report, and what changes could be made to get everyone on the same page.
Both Darling and Local Government Minister Jeff Carr agree the meeting was productive.
Carr says a number of changes were made to the document, including stronger wording and tighter timelines.
But, he says the reservations around the report are fair.
“People are cynical of government at all levels. People are nervous that governments at all levels will never follow through with what they say. All I can say is we’ve been working at this and we’re ready to continue working and we’ll do the best we can,” he told reporters.
Carr calls the decision a good day, and says the province has already started to get to work implementing the 20 action items.
“We have the regional task force in place, we’re tweaked that. We’ve wrote some initial charter motions… on each action item that the province is committed to putting forward,” he said.
“This is a major undertaking. This is serious, and I don’t disagree with the councillors in saying that this is serious, and we’re at the table with them and will continue to be.”
An updated copy of Sustaining Saint John: A Three Part Plan can be found online.
