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Swift Current Mayor Jerrod Schafer

Swift Current Mayor Jerrod Schafer joined other city mayors in Regina on Wednesday for the provincial budget presentation.

He says he's very pleased with the government's committment to municipalities, especially when it comes to revenue sharing, which increased again this year.

"The committment to the 1% of the PST still coming to municipalities is a huge revenue source," Schafer said. "It's been reliable and predictable, and it's grown as PST spending has obviously grown, and continuing to get that is huge for every municipality in the province. They did make some tough decisions, but that was one that they promised they'd continue to stick to."

Full interview with Jerrod Schafer

One of the tough decisions was the lack of any news on a new partnership for municipal infrastructure, but Schafer says he's confident that one will be worked out in the next year or so.

"I've always been under the impression that the lead on that particular file is the Federal Government, and we've always got clarity that this is the year that a lot of the infrastructure programs are expiring, and 2014 would be the big year, and we've always been waiting for 2014," he said. "We got some indications yesterday that the province is leaning that way as well, that they want to partner with the other levels of government, so we'll see today on the Federal Budget if they give any indication as to what's coming next year. I know the Federation of Canadian Municipalities has worked very hard with the Federal Government, and if nothing is announced today, I'm quite confident we'll see something next year for sure."

The budget also did not include news on funding for a new Long-Term Care Facility for Swift Current, which would replace the three aging facilities in the city and make up one of the pieces of the Integrated Facility concept, but Schafer is confident that something will be worked out on that soon.

"We had an opportunity to meet with the Premier and some staff, as well as the Health Region Chair, Tyler Bragg, and we did talk over some of the delays in it, and what we can do to get around those delays, and a big part of that is some clarity for the municipality and the region, and the government sorting things out as well," he added. "It's a dire need in our community and it's something that we're going to keep working towards. It may not have been announced in this budget, but all parties are working on it and it's a priority."