Business View Magazine November-December 2018

250 251 significant work achievements. Municipal taxes only increased 1.6 percent over four years. That increase was all in one year – the other three years were held to zero–while car- rying out the same level of service and, in most cases, more work, and adding equipment and staff to do the work. Mayor of the Rural Munici- pality of St. Andrews, George Pike, notes, “With all the infrastructure and expansion work going on here, we haven’t diminished our reserves, in fact, overall we’ve increased them. Some expenses highlighted this year came in under budget, so that’s money in the bank for further projects.” The Municipality has made great strides in work management and activity reporting which, in the past, was largely undocumented. Now, all requests for service are logged, tracked, assigned, and reported. The backlog for open work orders is less than 10 percent of all service requests re- ceived. Costs associated with staff time and work orders are allocated to each respective category to help with future service planning and budget- RURAL MUNICIPALITY OF ST. ANDREWS, MANITOBA ing. The information is also key to asset management which will soon be required by all municipalities. Councillor Russell Parado- ski, Finance Committee Chair of the Rural Municipality of St. Andrews, reports on one of the area’s prime assets: “We have our own airport in St. Andrews, which we took over from Transport Canada in 1999. One of the busier, small-craft, regional airports in Canada, it’s a training cen- ter for pilots and a hub for a lot of flights to First Nations and remote communities in northern Manitoba. An ex- pansion worth $2.3 million is going to additional lots, roads, and aprons and will bring more activity to the airport. The project is being completely funded internally through airport profits; no taxpayer dollars are being used. The St. Andrews Indus- trial Park, right beside the airport, is home to several technology businesses and we’re looking to expand that park to the south of the airport.” Environmental steward- ship is fundamental to the future of St. Andrews. In