The city will now be able to ask to borrow up to $15 million from the provincial government for this year’s budget, if at all needed.

That’s after the city council passed a Revenue Anticipation Bylaw at today’s meeting.

“Most municipalities use this in terms of shortfalls they may have in May and June, before property taxes come in during July. That’s the normal use of the Revenue Anticipation Bylaw. But this year, the government is intending for particularly smaller municipalities to cover the shortfall for business taxes that now aren’t coming in potentially until October, and for any defaults,” finance director Kathy Humphrey says.

Humphrey says the city doesn’t need the money right now, and it’s not clear if it would even qualify.

But she says passing the bylaw is prudent, just in case the city has to ask.

“We would have a year and a half to pay it back, it would have to be paid back by the end of 2021. And then it would have to be used, first off, to pay any outstanding debts we have to other [provincial] agencies, such as to school and hospital and that, and then could be used for the rest of it.”

Humphrey says the city collects about 15 per cent of property tax revenues from businesses.