At an April 13 Oak Bay in-camera council meeting, the budget for deer control was tabled and for the year 2014 Oak Bay had budgeted $25,000. According to the same document, $21,112 was spent. I do not know which calendar council was using but the deer cull to the best of my knowledge was held in 2015. What I as a taxpayer would like to know is what was the $21,112 spent on in 2014?
After the cull ended the mayor stated publicly that they had paid the contractor $16,000. The deer cull budget for 2015 is $35,000. Did that $16,000 come out of the 2015 budget? Again, if memory serves me, the mayor had stated that a cull of 25 deer was going to cost us $12,500. The amount spent in 2014 and spent so far in 2015 is a far cry from that $12,500, which in this case only took 11 deer.
The mayor also promised a full report on the costs and other items relating to the cull would be released by the end of March, not the middle of May. The complete lack of transparency is alarmingly obvious.
Ingrid Brown
Oak Bay