By Ruby Pratka
Local Journalism Initiative
Potton mayor Bruno Côté told the BCN in a year-end interview that he believed the town had “finally achieved stability” after several years of governance and infrastructure challenges.
Last week, the municipality tabled a balanced budget totalling over $16 million, the largest in recent memory – the 2023 budget was $9.3 million. Côté said $5.8 million of provincial government funding earmarked for the new fire station is the main reason for the increase.
“We’ve had big challenges over the past three years,” Côté said. “Three years ago we had to make a difficult decision to raise taxes, and we promised an increase of zero the following year … and we kept our promise. Last year, we had serious issues with the roads and we had to bring in an engineering service, who said the needed upkeep hadn’t been done for 20 years. The roads were beat up and we spent a lot of money re-gravelling the roads. Now is not the time to stop. This year, the budget as a whole went up, with [the new fire station and] an increase in road maintenance costs.”
The town will begin a call for tenders for the new fire station this year, which should be equipped with a decontamination room and a larger garage, eliminating the need for a fire crew to pick up a trailer or a support vehicle at another garage before going to a call, Côté said.
The municipality estimates that the average homeowner in the Mansonville sector will see their taxes go up by $8, from $1,839 to $1,847. Owl’s Head homeowners will see a steeper rise, from $3,772 to $4,220, an increase of $448 or nearly 12 per cent. The average rural homeowner will see a slight decrease, from $2,357 to $2,340. The average tax rate has risen from 38.75 cents per $100 to $39.4 cents per $100, less than a cent.
Other than ongoing road work, the new fire station and the purchase of a new fire truck, major planned infrastructure projects for 2025 include a new bike path linking the village and mountain sectors, opening a stage and amphitheatre in the Parc de la Grange ronde and making repairs to Église Saint-Cajetan, which the canton acquired from the Diocese of Saint-Hyacinthe in 2023 for a symbolic dollar and hopes to turn into a performance space and a community hall. The town will also establish its own boat patrol for the southern sector of Lake Memphremagog, stepping into the void left by the MRC which has discontinued its own lake patrol. The towns of Ogden and Stanstead will pay Potton to control their sections of the lake. “We’re the biggest municipality [in the MRC] in terms of territory and we need to show that we can take our responsibilities,” he said. “We’re continuing on with the big projects while keeping taxes at a reasonable level.”