Canmore Public Library, artsPlace and the museum society have all approached Canmore council asking for additional operational funding for 2017 and 2018.
Third party groups began presenting budget requests at the beginning of November to the finance committee, which is currently deliberating the 2017-18 operational and capital municipal budgets.
The committee is made entirely of council, and has replaced the former budget committee that met over the past several years and has in the past included public members.
It is also the first time Canmore’s elected officials are considering a two-year budget process – for both operational and capital – given the expectation that municipal governments will be required to prepare multi-year budgets in the future after changes are made to the Municipal Government Act.
Chief Administrative Officer Lisa de Soto said third party organizations that receive yearly funding from the municipality were informed that it was a tight budget year and recommended only “status quo increases.”
“We have done our best to work with them and find out their third party requests,” de Soto said.
The Canadian Mountain Arts Foundation, which operates artsPlace on contract for the municipality, requested additional funding for its operations in 2017.
Jeremy Elbourne, executive director of artsPlace, told council that after just over a year of operations under their belt, they now have a better idea of what their financial realities are.
“In spring 2015, we sat down as an organization and underwent two weekends of strategic planning,” Elbourne said. “It was an important exercise to undergo, but it is clear we did not have a sense of how artsPlace would operate on a practical level.”
Currently, the artsPlace financial situation predicts a deficit position at the end of 2016 of just over $34,000, which Elbourne said would be covered out of the organization’s cash reserve. However, for 2017 the organization requested $230,000 in operational funding and $220,000 in 2018. The organization has received $200,000 in funding from the municipality in 2016 and the two years previous.
With a strategic plan having been created before artsPlace opened last year, Elbourne said the board of directors is currently working on a new five-year strategic plan to reflect their actual operating realities and create a measurable plan for the organization.
“We are taking the meat of what we accomplished last year to have a functional plan with milestones and measurable targets for where we want to be in five years,” he said.
Looking back at the past year of operations, Elbourne said artsPlace delivered 434 programs, saw 9,787 participants, had 16,915 visitors and contracted 120 artists to instruct or perform.
He said the range of programming has been broad, but the area that has seen the greatest challenge is movie screenings. Elbourne said when planning for the facility they expected a greater uptake in film attendance – but the reality is that movies at the theatre are hit and miss.
With spotty attendance, and the unanticipated factor of paying the company that provides the film for screening a percentage based on attendance – Elbourne said revenues have not materialized.
Another success seen at artsPlace, he said, are the partnerships the facility has formed with local groups that have hosted fundraisers there and raised over $20,000 to support various endeavours.
Even with all the successes over its first year, Elbourne said, artsPlace is an organization without historical data or experience of how the building functions.
“All things considered, we have done well,” he said.
Even with the increased funding request from the municipality, he said, the plan is to increase fees, restructure staff, and increase fundraising efforts. He said the organization does not want to cut staff at this time, because the number of staff artsPlace employs is directly related to the number of programs it can offer – which is its major revenue source.
Elbourne said he expects 2018 to be the year that artsPlace sets its baseline budget to work with into the future – and require less municipal funding.
The Canmore Museum and Geoscience Centre has been receiving operating support from the municipality for multiple years and last year received a $135,800 operating grant.
This year, said curator Lachlan MacIntosh, the museum has requested $145,000 and in 2018 $155,000 – representing a 6.8 per cent and 6.9 per cent increase.
The main challenge and need for additional funding, he said, has been to keep the museum fully staffed with two full-time and two part-time positions.
In addition to launching a new exhibit in 2016, the museum also celebrated the creation of an archive space – both of which require additional staff resources.
The museum’s work will continue next year with the Lamphouse restoration project – which has $170,000 over the next two years in the budget. That meant total expenses for 2017 were proposed at $456,710 – up considerably over the year before due to the Lamphouse project.
Canmore Public Library was also requesting a significant increase in funding for 2017 due to the fact it is very popular in the community and with visitors and its only real funding source is municipal dollars.
Library director Michelle Preston said the average library membership rate in Alberta is 32 per cent, but in Canmore it’s 56 per cent.
That means 56 per cent of people who are residents of the community have active library cards – which the library does charge a nominal fee for and sees $25,000 in revenues from annually.
With the library serving as a key part of Elevation Place, Preston said its popularity has grown and not only is the it open seven days a week, it offers a wide variety of programming.
A new factor library staff have had to contend with in 2016 has been the Me Card program, according to Preston. The Me Card is provided to any Albertan who has a library membership but wishes to use the services at another library location in the province.
A total of 2,100 people used their Me Cards at the Canmore library this year, which required staff time and resources without any additional revenues because the Me Card is free in Alberta.
Significant programs the library has taken up this year include working with Origin at Spring Creek to bring a reading program into that facility for seniors, books on the bus with Roam Transit, and the availability of physical literacy kits.
For 2017, Preston said, the library is requesting an additional $88,000 to the $754,000 the municipality funded this year. That means the library would like the Town to provide $842,375 in 2017 and $875,123 in 2018.
Preston said staff salaries and benefits are the biggest expense for the library and in 2017 the budget includes a 1.3 per cent cost of living increase in line with the municipality.
The biggest change this year is the fact it has taken over processing its own payroll services. Until this year, the municipality processed the library’s payroll, which led to confusion, especially at tax time when T4s were issued by the Town of Canmore, which is not technically the library staff’s employer.
Absorbing the workload to process payroll has affected the staff’s workload, Preston said.
While the library does have reserve accounts, board treasurer Peter McKeown said they would quickly be drawn down if used to cover operating shortfalls expected.
McKeown said reserves shouldn’t be looked at as a sustainable funding source for library operations.
“Eventually, we will run out of reserves and then it will become a priority if all of a sudden the library request goes up,” he said.
As for how the library would deal with a lack of revenues to meet expenses, Preston said the obvious area to cut would be operating hours and staff.
“After responding to public demand to increase services, it would be a hard thing to do.”
As for increasing fees, she said libraries in Alberta are moving towards free membership like Banff and Exshaw libraries currently offer. Even with the fees being low – $12 for an individual and $20 for a family – Preston said they are barriers to accessing library services.
