It didn’t take Mayor Cam Guthrie very long to think of what the biggest issues facing city hall were in 2024 – the municipal budget and homelessness.
Those issues, both of which include a large variety of complex factors as well as the involvement of other levels of government, consumed much of his time in the past 12 months.
And while he’s proud of the progress made on each front, he believes the work is far from complete.
“The city portion of the budget, we cut the property tax impact by 50 per cent. That took a lot of work, people don't maybe fully appreciate the amount of work that actually took to go line by line, literally line by line to cut, pause and defer multiple millions of dollars (in projects and services) to try and bring about a more affordable increase,” Guthrie said during a year-end interview with GuelphToday.
He’s referring to the late November confirmation of the city-controlled portion of the 2025 municipal budget, which includes a 3.6 per cent property tax increase. Once outside boards and committees are factored in next month, the overall increase will likely be in the range of 6.1 per cent.
When the 2024 to 2027 budget was initially set last year, the 2025 increase was 9.79 per cent.
“The impact is something that I'm really proud of,” Guthrie said of the lessened tax hike. “It was nice to see that result. And I think the public have also indicated to me that they're very thankful for that too, because the affordability issues are very, very, very real for both citizens and for businesses.”
Efforts to revise the 2026 and 2027 budgets are expected to get underway soon, with a continued focus on affordability, the mayor said.
While supportive and social housing aren’t direct city responsibilities – that’s handled by the County of Wellington, in part on the city’s behalf, and dependent on provincial funding – Guelphites are impacted by them both financially and from a community perspective.
The city contributes annually to the county’s efforts, puts funds in reserve to assist supportive housing projects, controls municipal approvals for such projects and has taken on responsibility for determining where encampments can and can’t be set up, as well as the enforcement of those rules.
“What I would like to really drive home is that Guelph is actually doing very well when it comes to trying to tackle (homelessness) and that is not solely because of the Guelph city hall and Guelph council. It's because of community stakeholders and the County of Wellington, who is our social services manager – everyone collaborating together over several years,” Guthrie said, pointing to the recent or upcoming addition of 108 units of supportive housing through several projects.
“Did we solve it with a 108? No, but can you imagine where we would be today if we had not started years ago on this journey to make sure that we were focusing on this type of housing.
“The other part of the housing issue is something that is so outside of the municipal control.”
That latter comment is in reference to decreased housing starts throughout the province, with developers failing to move ahead on fully approved projects, in addition to interest rates, construction costs, labour shortages and more.
The city budget and homelessness aren’t entirely separate matters, with each related directly to issues of affordability in the city (and elsewhere).
Property taxes increase costs for residents and businesses, and municipal funding of homelessness-related matters result in increased property taxes – from the city’s contribution to the County of Wellington’s supportive and social housing initiatives to the cost of creating and enforcing the public space use bylaw that restricts where encampments can be set up.
“Myself and the Ontario Big city Mayors caucus has been saying over and over again how much we need the province to help with the healthcare side of a lot of these issues, as the municipality tries to help with the zoning or the policy work or the or giving money towards projects like the 108 supportive housing units that are getting built,” said Guthrie “And so, I was thankful that the province is looking at the new HART hub model as an example, I'm very thankful that the province made that $75 million announcement (on Dec. 13) that I've been advocating for and to help with sort of urgent urgent needs of people in encampments.”
Guthrie added he’s glad to see police focusing on open drug use, especially in the downtown core, as well as sex trafficking and intimate partner violence.
“When our head hits the pillow at night, it's safe under our homes, we have to remember that there are heads hitting pillows that are under the control of a criminal element,” he said.
“As much as we make a dent in automobile thefts, which they've done, or make a dent in drug enforcement, which they've done, it's time to turn our attention to these disgusting criminal acts that are also occurring in the city and tackle that as well.”
Among the highlights of the year for Guthrie has been seeing construction progress being made on the new central library and South End Community Centre (SECC).
“It's nice to see them both on time and on budget,” he said.
Approved by council in 2020 the library is expected to cost $62 million and is anticipated to open in the fall of 2026.
The SECC was approved at that same meeting, with a cost of $115.5 million, and is also expected to open in the fall of 2026.
