How will the changes to the MSP premiums impact the City of Quesnel ?
We asked Director of Finance Kari Bolton…
“In a year like 2017 the City paid approximately 152 thousand in MSP premiums. Going forward with the Employer Health Tax we’re going to be paying about 193 thousand dollars a year, so about a 40 thousand dollar increase. The issue with 2019 is we are going to have to pay MSP premiums, although only 50 percent of them, and then the Employer Health Tax the same year, so it will be a higher cost year for us.”
Bolton says that total bill will be around 270 thousand dollars, although she says the City did plan ahead to reduce the impact on taxpayers…
“In 2018 we only had to pay 50 percent of the MSP premiums so we had budgeted for the full 100 percent, so we’re going to take that 50 percent savings from 2018 that we had, and put it towards the 2019, and then we will have to tax increase to cover the slight difference.”
Bolton says the difference in 2020 will be around 40 thousand dollars and she says the City will have to budget for that.
She says that process is currently underway.
Bolton says the changes to MSP will have a bigger impact on bigger cities.