Foothills County ratepayers will see a 3.57 per cent hike in their property taxes in 2024.

Reeve Delilah Miller says that will allow them to keep services at the same level as this year.

"We're not cutting services, this is the same level of service for residents, we're certainly not cutting services, and this takes into account any new staff and I don't think we have that many, I think we've got three planned for this year that we've added and not planning to any more in the upcoming year," she says.

The county did have some changes last year which Miller says it made it look like they'd hired more people, but it was just some changes to the organizational chart.

Administration has come up with a booklet that spells out the budget for each department in detail, so residents have a good idea where their money's going.

Miller says it should help with transparency and help make residents aware of the cost's council has to deal with.

"Fire apparatus were around $450,000 ten years ago, they're well over $650,000 now. Our graders were around $490,000, they're well over $600,000 now as well," she points out.

The county has over 2,200 kilometres of ditches to grade and mow so the equipment won't last forever.

She says staff always try to find gently used equipment because, between the time they order new equipment and it's built the price can jump dramatically.

In response to Canada's Online News Act and Meta (Facebook and Instagram) removing access to local news from their platforms, HighRiverOnline and OkotoksOnline encourage you to get your news directly from your trusted source by bookmarking this page and downloading the HighRiverOnline or OkotoksOnline app.