| 2010 Operating Budget & Business Planning Guidelines |
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10. Increase Revenue Through User Fee Reviews
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Another opportunity to minimize a tax increase is to maximize revenue generation through user fees and service charges. It is important to emphasize that any reduction in a user fee or service charge cost recovery ratio will have a corresponding direct impact on the City’s levy. Therefore, to minimize any impact on the City’s tax rate it is important to sustain or improve revenue/cost relationships. In addition to adjusting revenues for anticipated changes in activity, departments will be required to review user fees and service charges and perform the following:
- Increase user fees and charges in relation to department cost increases
- Submit new user fee and service charge opportunities
As a default, it is anticipated that department user fees & service charges will increase at minimum, by the rate of inflation, in 10 cent increments, unless justification for no increase is otherwise specified. The Statistics Canada Ontario inflation rate increased 1.8% for the 12 month period ending March 2009. The 5 year historical average is approximately 1.9%.
The above actions will be submitted for Senior Management review and Council approval.
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