CITY GAINS $63M IN SAVINGS, EFFICIENCIES & LAND SALES

Saskatoon taxpayers continue to benefit from the City’s renewed commitment to continuous improvement and performance monitoring. Through Continuous Improvement efforts, the City was able to increase savings in 2014 by reviewing its Civic Services and thinking ‘outside-the-box.’

“With a vision of being the best-managed city in Canada, we’ve set our sights on doing better with what we have, to deliver better value for taxes,” said Catherine Gryba, General Manager of Corporate Performance. “We’ve seen those efforts pay off and the City will keep making strides toward better service, more savings and sustainable growth.”

Better service to citizens, increased savings, and sustainable environmental programs are all results of the City’s Continuous Improvement Strategy.  The 2014 Report on Service, Savings and Sustainability: How the City of Saskatoon is Improving Productivity demonstrates the City’s accomplishments in those areas.

The City’s attention to innovative thinking and improved service levels contributed to building better roads, providing online business licence applications and renewals, opening a new outdoor fitness centre at River Landing, and many other program and operation improvements.

The result for savings is approximately $15.4 million in financial returns from Saskatoon Land, $17.7 million in operational efficiencies and service level enhancements as well as $29.6 million in deferred capital spending, including:

- $10.6 million in Water and Sewer upgrades were completed using “trenchless methods” to extend the service life of the main, saving 33 per cent over traditional open excavation replacement methods; allowing the City to do more preservation work for the same amount of money.

- Over $2.0 million through the Saskatoon Fire department in immediate short term operational savings as well as over $14 million in capital savings and improvements to citizen safety resulting from rethinking deployment of current and future fire stations.

- Over $1.4 million rebate from the Saskatchewan Workers’ Compensation Board (WCB) as a result of a positive performance between 2011 and 2013 and a positive investment year for WCB.

City environmental programs are also contributing to sustainable growth by helping to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by the equivalent of removing 18,750 cars off city roads.  Continued focus on recycling programs also diverted approximately 20,000 tonnes of waste from the Saskatoon Landfill in 2014.

Gryba notes concentrating on Continuous Improvement is central to planning for the City’s future growth.

“Improving effectiveness and efficiency in our current operations ensures we deliver affordable and sustainable programs and enables us to be collaborative and responsive in our growth to half a million people,” says Gryba.

Focusing on our long-term goal to manage the City in a smart, sustainable way, supports the City’s seven Strategic Goals and being the best-managed city in Canada.