Saint-Martin : A 201M€ budget for 2016

The preliminary budget (PB) voted on Thursday by the elected officials exceeds 200 million euros for the first time and comes to exactly 201.6 M€. It is almost twice the PB voted in 2008, one year after becoming a Collectivité. It has gone up 16.5 % compared to 2015.

OPERATIONS: 40% OF THE EXPENDITURE ABSORBED BY THE RSA AND PERSONNEL COSTS

The operations section represents more than two-thirds of the budget of the Collectivité with a total of 136.87 million euros.

Operating costs

The main expenditures are for the personnel. Indeed, these costs represent 28.4% of the operating expenses or 39 million euros. They have increased by 2.7 million euros as has been pointed out by the Opposition leader, Daniel Gibbs. The President Aline Hanson has justified this 7.2% increase by recruitments particularly among the volunteer firefighters and the territorial police force which now has 23 officers, and also at the city school (concierge, etc.) and management positions at the Collectivité.

The second important chapter of expenditure concerns general costs, with a total amount of 21.6 M€. This budget includes mainly expenditures related to the territorial vocational training program, school transportation, the cleaning service and waste collection contract, the Collectivité building maintenance costs, insurance costs, etc. All of these costs are down by 18% compared to last year.

Although still significant, the envelope for the active solidarity income (RSA) has been reduced by 845,000 € and this year comes to 17,105 million euros. While bearing in mind that the annual contribution received from the State - 766,000 euros - will not change. The RSA represents 12.5 % of the operating expenses.

The operating costs of the groups of elected officials, which will amount to 160,000 euros in 2016, have also been reduced by one-third.

Allocations to provisions have been increased, from 10 to 14 million euros "in order to cope with the portion of income and property tax rolls issued in 2016 which will not be collected during the fiscal period".

Operating revenues

This year, the Collectivité is counting on a significant progression of its revenues coming from taxes and fees. 81.06 million euros have been budgeted, nearly a 5.2 million increase compared to 2015. It is also + 16.6 million compared to 2014.

The tax service director of the Collectivité has indeed noticed better behavior among the citizens. For example, revenues coming from income tax have increased by 45 %. Nevertheless, the product of direct taxation is stable at 15.49 M€ (+2% in two years).

The President Aline Hanson did not fail to point out, once again, "the non-payment by the State of 4.5 million source compensation in 2008 and 2009 for Income Tax and Corporate Tax"; a phrase which is repeated every year, to the last decimal point, at every IB presentation. Likewise the "non-payment by the State of 1.8 M€ for the compensation for the games during the fiscal years from 2008 to 2012". However, to recover these amounts owed, the Collectivité decided to take legal action against the State in 2015.

INVESTMENTS

The investment section represents 64.8 million euros.

Investment revenues

The estimated revenues amounted to 53.6 million euros but thanks to a 11.19 million balance made at the level of the investment grants, they finally amounted to 64.8 million. 12.9 million also come from the operations section. More than 14 m come from capitalised operating surpluses. Investment revenues have thus increased by over 49.3% compared to 2015 and 2014, periods during which they were roughly 43 million euros.

Investment expenditures

Without considering the deferral of a negative budget outturn of 24.6 million, investment expenditures are down 10% to 38.88 million. Fixed assets under construction are valued at 20.12 million and 4.6 million for assimilated loans and debts.

All of the elected members of the majority adopted the initial budget; the Daniel Gibbs Team voted against it, and Jules Charville abstained.