Budgets are always tricky things, I know. And most people aren’t paid to sift through them like me. Even I get stuff wrong on them – but since I have direct line to the treasurers they are very helpful in going through them with me.

Long way of saying, streelights are not 1% of operating budget, they’re 1% of property taxes for Town services. It’s actually a big difference in dollars.

Operating budget for Milton is about $68 million for 2010. Property taxes will be about $28 million.

http://www.milton.ca/corpserv/budget10/Operating_Budget_Summary.pdf (start reading from page 5)

I think Town staff put the graph there because they think people want to know where their property taxes go. Of course, the rest of the budget is also people’s money, in other ways.

The majority of operating budget is paid for through user fees, government grants, etc. while capital budget is mostly paid for through money that comes from developers (DCs and capital provision reserves), Province and Feds, and OLG slots at Mohawk Racetrack.