Proposed cut to Whitehorse senior utility rebate frustrates longtime resident

Longtime Whitehorse resident Rick Karp is frustrated that city council is considering slashing the senior utility rebate in half.

“You rely on these things. You've given so much to the city and to the territory, and this is just a little payback,” Karp said. “It's just frustrating that they want to take away from that.”

Karp is a former president of the Whitehorse Chamber of Commerce. He said affordability in Whitehorse has gone downhill over the years as the cost of groceries has gone up. He said the senior utility rebate helps people like him pay for a couple of trips to the grocery store.

Mayor Kirk Cameron said the City of Whitehorse’s proposed 2026-28 operating budget – worth about $125.6 million – is focused on necessities as the city prepares to make tough choices. He said the city has limited resources to deliver programs and services that residents rely on and limited options to generate revenue.

The budget proposes a 4.6-per-cent hike in property taxes. Water and sewer would go up by eight per cent.

Cameron said the city proposed cutting the senior utility rebate from $500 to $250 because the cost of the program has increased by nearly 30 per cent. The city’s rebate to residents aged 65 and up (or surviving spouses who meet the program’s criteria) comes from fees paid to the city for water, sewer and curbside collection services.

“It’s one where there’s been massive growth over the last number of years, just people who are relying, or applying for that program,” Cameron said. 

In the long term, he said the city is looking at tying the utility rebate program to an applicant’s income.

Cameron said there aren’t new revenue streams to tap into at the territorial and federal levels.

“We’re just trying to keep the lid on the existing funding programs that we have in place,” he said. 

Cameron said the proposed operating budget needs to be read in the context of the capital budget, which council passed last December. He said there’s an upcoming public input session at city hall on March 9 as part of the operating budget process.

“If we hear loud and clear that people want changes to the budget, we still have second and third reading where we can apply good thinking from our citizens,” he said. “But I warn, they aren’t going to be substantial adjustments.”

Bev Buckway served as the city’s mayor more than a decade ago. She said the introduction of the senior utility rebate predated her time on council, although talks around the potential impact of reducing it took place.

Buckway said $500 went a lot further back in the day.