Data and Comments on New Brunswick Issues
Who should pay for local roads in New Brunswick? Towns and cities take care of their own road maintenance, with some cost-sharing from the provincial government. In rural areas, that responsibility is taken on by the province. Is that fair? Should rural residents, most of whom live in ‘one-acre-lot’ rural suburbs, be asked to pay...
[Note: I suggest reading these two previous posts, found here and here, on this subject for additional background material.] Do residents of Local Service Districts (LSDs) in New Brunswick pay too much or too little for the services they receive from governments? That is a question that has been raised before in this Province and...
The Finn Report (also known as Building Stronger Local Governments and Regions: An Action Plan for the Future of Local Governance in New Brunswick) was released in December 2008 and contained a number of recommendations regarding local governance in New Brunswick. The Report was produced by the Local Governance Commission that had been established in September 2007 by...
A few months ago, the government of New Brunswick released its plan for reforming local governance. This has been a long time coming and it appears that fiscal pressures have finally forced action. While problems in local governance and cost-sharing have long been recognized, political resistance to change has prevented action until now. The Province...