The city manager’s reserve has been topped up following a Lloydminster council motion.
The reserve is established for emergencies and does not require council approval to be used. It will be replenished at the end of each year or as approved by council at a balance of $500,000.
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With the reserve funding emergencies, it also means council doesn’t have to approve small fund transfers, slowing down whatever the money would be used for.
“Those are items that have been approved by council in many cases, but for $1,500 as an example, do you come back to council and stop everything,” said Lloydminster Mayor Gerald Aalbers.
“In the cases of making a capital purchase, there was cases where things came up and that’s where you’ll see some capital needs in a case of where there was an adjustment to a capital project already approved.”
Aalbers says the reserve exists to cover anything that comes up.
“It’s kind of like a stabilization fund to ensure there’s enough money to cover, especially when we get challenges that come up,” he said.
Coun. Michele Charles Gustafson asked how often the fund was replenished during the March 10 council meeting.
“This replenishment is up until Dec. 31, 2024, essentially. We’re just going through audits and finalizing all our numbers so now we know how much was expensed through all the capital projects we can bring it forward to you to replenish. We will report on it quarterly, and if we need to replenish it sooner than every year because we don’t want to run out, we’ll do it at that quarterly update,” said Ryan Hill, financial planning and analysis manager with the City of Lloydminster.
Hill says this will be the second time in 2024 with the first top-up happening in Q2.
Aalbers says the $371,200.59 will be used to replenish the fund.
“What happens now is it is allocated to the proper costings, so that’s why it’s replenished and charged against the various accounts,” he said.
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