On Tuesday, January 21, 2025, Brandon City Council received their third presentation of the proposed 2025 budget from City of Brandon Administration. Tuesday’s pre-budget session was an overview of community grant requests, a four-year budget forecast, and an overview of reserve funds.
The City of Brandon provides grants and contributions for various initiatives that enhance quality of life, including museums, athletics, tourism, performing arts, and multicultural activities. Other grants encourage growth, revitalization, and economic activity.
Grants constitute 8% of general revenue fund expenditures, including multi-year agreements amounting to $10.28M, and $597K in discretionary agreements. Multi-year agreements include entities such as the Keystone Centre, Riverbank Inc., Westman Regional Library, and Brandon Downtown Development Corporation, amongst others. Grants and other funding agreements are considered operating expenses, funded by general revenues, reserves and senior levels of government. Grants to service and cultural organizations are reviewed by the grants review committee and passed by City Council at budget deliberations.
The strategy for developing a four-year budget encompasses consideration of inflationary costs ranging from 2-5%, contractual obligations, forecasted debt servicing obligations, capital funding requirements, alternative revenue models, and provincial funding sources.
The four-year budget highlights the tax revenue required for the next four years. In 2025: the proposed tax revenue requirement is $58,434M, a year over year increase of $6,276M or 12%. For 2026: it’s $65,958M, an increase of $7,524M or 12.9%, for 2027: $72,367M, a year over year increase of $6,409M or 9.7% – and for 2028: $76,248M, an increase of $3,881M or 5.4%.
Lastly, City Council received a presentation on reserve funds. The presentation covered capital funding projects, operating projects, and funding towards reserves. Some highlights include $56.2M toward planned capital funding projects, including $18.4M for fleet upgrades, $7.1M for facilities, $10.1M for the transportation network, and $4.2M for parks and recreation.
Brandon City Council will deliberate the 2025 proposed budget as prepared by City Administration on Fri, Jan. 24, 2025 at 8:30 a.m., and Sat, Jan. 25, 2025 at 8:30 a.m. Residents can also follow the presentations and deliberations on the City of Brandon’s YouTube Channel @CityofBrandonMB. Westman Communications Group will also be live streaming this event.
All proposed 2025 budget documents are available at City of Brandon – 2025 Proposed Budget
The 2025 proposed budget will require an additional $6.2 million in municipal taxes levied. That would require a 12% increase in revenue, which for an average property owner would be an 11.7% increase in the municipal portion of their tax bill from last year.
City Council welcomes comments or feedback on the proposed 2025 budget, which can be sent via email to budget@brandon.ca
