Saskatoon may still be weeks away from spring but the city is already seeing green, as preliminary year-end financials from 2024 show a surplus of $12.27 million with the lion’s share coming from the city’s investment portfolio.
“We were expecting interest rates to go down a little bit quicker than they did, bonds perhaps not to be as resilient as they were throughout 2024, but luckily for us and a lot of other investors, those remained resilient in 2024 and we saw an extra nine million dollars through our investment income higher than we had originally budgeted for,” said Clae Hack, chief financial officer for the city of Saskatoon.
The financials include a surplus of $4.96 million in transit operations and $4.87 million in city-wide savings found by administration.
However, there was a $6.48-million deficit in the budget for snow and ice.
The city says activating the emergency snow response plan last March cost $5.5 million.
Hack says the plan is to put the surplus into city reserves, adding putting the money in reserves allows for more long-term flexibility.
“We have a historical practice and it’s served us well in terms of our financial sustainability as a city here to put it into things like fiscal reserve to save for those rainy days or when things maybe aren’t as good as they turned out in 2024,” said Hack.
The recommendations made by administration will be up for debate at the next finance committee meeting on March 5.
–with files from Gates Guarin, Global News.