City council approves 3 high-priced Remai Modern jobs, but with reservations

Remai Modern Art Museum, the first group up to bat at Monday's 2019 Saskatoon budget approval session, faced some tough questions about its plan to add three high-priced positions to the city tax roll. 

The jobs, whose costs (including salaries) will total $264,500, were ultimately approved 6-5 by city councillors.

However, Coun. Randy Donauer and other councillors expressed reservations and voted against the Remai budget top-up that allows the museum to proceed with the new hires.  

"We've spent a lot of money at the Remai and we're all very proud of it, but there's a lot of things we're trying to accomplish in the city and we have to say 'no' to a lot of departments," Donauer said.

The new positions are:

• A full time Indigenous relations manager, full cost: $105,800.
• A full-time computer technician, full cost: $105,800.
• A new part-time human resource manager, full cost: $52,900. 

Contract workers are currently carrying out the latter two roles. 

The relations manager "is required to develop, implement and maintain the overall Indigenous relations strategy and comprehensive workforce diversity strategy," according to a city budget document. 

Coun. Darren Hill suggested money could be saved by having the Indigenous relations manager shared between Remai Modern and the corporations that run two other city-owned buildings, TCU Place and SaskTel Centre.

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However, his motion to have the budget top-up eliminated did not gain enough votes.

He says not knowing how much the contract workers are being paid on an annual basis made it hard to compare the relative merit of bringing the positions in-house. 

A 4.5% tax hike on the table

The preliminary budget is proposing a 4.5 per cent tax hike to pay for $511 million in city spending. That would mean taxes for people with a home worth $371,000 would increase by $81 a year.

Large spending projects include $13.5 million for upgrades to the Sid Buckwold bridge. The money would be spent on replacing the bridge's asphalt surface, as well as widening its pedestrian walkway.

Administration believes if the bridge isn't fixed, there could be a structural failure over the next ten years.

Council will also be debating whether to raise the cost of leisure passes. If the changes are approved, an adult pass would increase by five dollars, while a family pass would increase by $10.

In 2018, council voted to increase taxes by 3.79 per cent. 

Council began its special meeting at 1 p.m. CT. The three-day session is expected to end Wednesday night.