Saint John will not try bringing forward non-resident user fees for rinks again — at least not this season.
The city will instead raise hourly rates for all users as it tries once again for a regional cost-sharing model.
It is not the first time Saint John has tried to work with its municipal counterparts to find common ground on funding ice arenas.
But Tim O’Reilly, the city’s deputy commissioner of parks and recreation, said new positive developments may encourage the region to come together again.
“The recent regional agreement on economic development, the city’s right-sizing efforts around its arenas, and a recent commitment to pursue a comprehensive ice strategy in the year 2021,” said O’Reilly during an Aug. 4 council meeting.
Saint John, Rothesay, Quispamsis, Grand Bay-Westfield, St. Martins and the local service districts spent more than a year trying to come up with a regional ice strategy, but those plans skid to a halt in 2019.
Several weeks later, Saint John council voted to move ahead with the controversial non-resident user fees for the 2019-20 ice season.
But that plan was scrapped in November after the Saint John Hotel Association stepped in to cover all expected costs from regional user fees for one year.
“We’ve gotten rid of this fiasco about user fees outside the city. There’s no bone of contention here,” said Coun. Blake Armstrong.
The new arena fees for the upcoming season will range from $115 to $289 per hour, depending on the time of day and user group. The previous rates ranged from $79 to $186 per hour.
Mayor Don Darling says despite the ice rate increases, arenas will still be heavily subsidized by city taxpayers.
“It’s the right decision to take one more kick at this as a region on arenas that could lead to a look at how we might deliver fire service and police service,” said Darling.
This season, the city will only recover 54 per cent of operating costs for each youth, 64 per cent for each senior and 81 per cent for each adult. Saint John currently covers all of the capital costs for its rinks.
Last year, Darling said the city spent more than $1.6 million to operate its arenas but only recovered $681,000 through user fees.
“Maybe our costs have down a little bit, we’re going to get our user fees up a little bit, and we’re still going to subsidize somewhere in the range of $900,000-plus,” he said.
O’Reilly said a regional cost-sharing model is the most effective way to ensure city taxpayers are only subsidizing Saint John resident arena users.
But if a regional solution cannot be found, he said staff will once again recommend non-resident user fees to council.
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