City community groups are the core of any community.
To suggest at any point there is a need to reduce the amount of groups the city gives grant money to, or operational grants or otherwise, are fighting words in many people’s eyes.
Yet city council is heading down that road, looking at what the city maintains, and how it could get by with less.
It likely won’t mean less community groups, or the paving of paradise to put up a parking lot, but it could mean reduced service in the way the service groups are managed.
The real bitter pill to swallow is the realization of what the city of less than 4,000 people is grappling with: bringing big city amenities and attitudes of service to a community that has no industrial base and, population wise, can’t skate with the bigger players in the province.
Council has leveled its gaze on every aspect of the city’s budget and, therefore, its operation and how much it contributes to community groups are part of that glance.