{"id":34638,"date":"2024-05-30T17:02:57","date_gmt":"2024-05-30T21:02:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=34638"},"modified":"2024-05-30T17:02:59","modified_gmt":"2024-05-30T21:02:59","slug":"community-input-sought-for-budget-2025-and-pizza-is-in-the-offing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/community-input-sought-for-budget-2025-and-pizza-is-in-the-offing\/","title":{"rendered":"Community input sought for Budget 2025 \u2013 and pizza is in the offing"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Whether you\u2019re hungry for change or simply hungry for pizza, consider taking part in the Town\u2019s annual Budget Survey.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Community input is now being sought on Aurora\u2019s financial blueprint for the coming year through the Town\u2019s Engage Aurora portal at engageaurora.ca\/budget2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYour voice matters greatly in shaping the financial direction of our community for the coming year,\u201d says the Town. \u201cThis survey is your chance to share your priorities, concerns, and aspirations, ensuring that the budget aligns closely with the needs and desires of all residents.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Participants will be entered for a chance to win a pizza dinner for four valued at $50.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe want residents to feel empowered to shape the future of our community,\u201d said Mayor Tom Mrakas in a statement. \u201cThe \u2018Slice it Your Way\u2019 campaign encourages everyone to participate and contribute to decisions that impact Aurora. All feedback will be shared directly with the Aurora Town Council for their consideration during the budget planning process. The Town Council is committed to transparency and ensuring that the budget reflects the needs and priorities for the community.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This year\u2019s survey is more concise than in years past \u2013 and it\u2019s the goal of the Financial Services department to \u201cminimize\u201d how much of a resident\u2019s time is needed to complete the survey, says Jason Gaertner, Financial Manager for the Town of Aurora.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt is to reduce the number of questions yet hopefully glean from the remaining questions a feeling from residents as to whether [they feel] they\u2019re getting good value for their tax dollars as well as a bit of feedback on which Town services in particular they\u2019re most interested in. Generally speaking, we always leave a potential kind of comment box at the end\u2026 that captures any other feedback they might like to provide.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe have one question that speaks to a lot of the major service areas the Town provides; there\u2019s a question that asks the respondent to identify the three service areas they would like to see more tax dollars spent and we\u2019re hoping through that to get an idea as to how our residents and businesses actually prioritize these services that are most important to them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In previous budget years, Gaertner says he and his department have presented what they\u2019ve taken from the survey directly to Council. This will again be the case this year, he stresses, and then Council has the \u201copportunity every year to adjust the budget in response to the feedback that we have received.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cCouncil is hearing what the survey respondents are saying,\u201d says Gaertner. \u201cIt\u2019s up to them to respond to that feedback and they do. Last year, we had 60-ish responses. We didn\u2019t give all 60 responses verbatim to Council, but we summarized what we heard and provided it to them in the form of a memo to the Budget Committee.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the end of the day, it\u2019s all about getting that all-important resident feedback \u2013 and Gaertner says the overriding message is this feedback does indeed matter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf the existing questions in the survey don\u2019t allow residents to get their feedback to us, by all means use that last question to share that feedback in words with us,\u201d he stresses. \u201cIf a resident doesn\u2019t want to do the formal online survey, send that feedback to ourtownbudget@aurora.ca<\/a> and we can take feedback that way.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cSlice it Your Way\u201d campaign runs through June 16<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-34638","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-90G","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-14 10:52:35","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34638","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34638"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34638\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34638"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34638"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34638"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}