The report provides an overview of how municipalities use financial reserves, and their important role in long-term planning and efficient municipal spending
Last week, RMA released Understanding Municipal Financial Reserves, a report intended to provide provincial decision-makers, stakeholders, and the public about the important role that financial reserves play in effective planning in municipalities of all types. The report is intended to help address misconceptions that municipal financial reserves are a sign of municipal “wealth” and over-taxation by explaining that due to the limited options municipalities have to access large amounts of capital for major infrastructure projects, reserves are often a municipality’s only means of funding major projects such as bridge replacements or wastewater treatment facilities.
RMA members are encouraged to utilize the report when discussing the role of municipal financial reserves with local residents and businesses, as well as other stakeholders.
The report can be accessed here, and the media release that accompanied the report can be accessed here.
Members are also encouraged to revisit RMA’s 2013 report, Apples to Apples: Rural Municipal Finance in Alberta, for an important overview of rural municipal finances and how fiscal realities differ for rural and urban municipalities.
For enquiries, please contact:
Wyatt Skovron
Senior Policy Advisor
wyatt@RMAlberta.com
Tasha Blumenthal
Director of External Relations & Advocacy
tasha@RMAlberta.com