Guelph councillors met long into the night on Wednesday, but weren’t able to hammer out a final budget to guide the city through 2016.
As of 11:30 p.m., councillors were looking at a proposed property tax increase of 3.32 per cent, even though some of them had been hoping for a number below two per cent.
A number of items had been agreed upon, including increasing Guelph Transit cash fares to $3.25 – instead of the $4 that had been proposed – and cutting the frequency of buses during peak hours and in the summertime.
According to the head of the union representing Guelph Transit drivers, the service cuts will result in the loss of more than 20 jobs – and likely won’t be popular with their ridership, either.
“To ask somebody to pay more money for less service is going to be troublesome for a lot of passengers,” Andrew Cleary, president of the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1189, told CTV News.
Bus passes for people living in low-income households are seeing their prices dropped, from $37 to $32 for adults and from $34 to $27.20 for youth and seniors.
Councillors will return to their budget deliberations at 6 p.m. Thursday.
