Service, Savings & Sustainability: Impactful achievements despite challenging year

For immediate release: July 19, 2021 - 1:00 pm

ST21-2344

The City’s 2020 Report on Service, Savings and Sustainability (SSS Report) highlights how teams worked together, and apart, in 2020 to find new and improved ways to deliver services to residents during the pandemic while focusing on finding savings and reducing our impact on the environment.

“I am very proud of our City employees,” says Celene Anger, Chief Strategy and Transformation Officer. “Despite last year’s extraordinary circumstances, including a work-from-home directive impacting about 1,000 staff, they continued to find innovative ways to continue the safe delivery of essential core services to residents, maximize value for taxpayer dollars and minimize costs for the Corporation.”

“Even with the challenges of 2020, the City moved forward on several major projects including the approval of our Official Community Plan and nationally recognized Green Infrastructure Strategy,” Anger adds. “From making the switch to LED streetlights, adding GPS to our City fleet of vehicles, or the innovative ways found to administer the civic election during the pandemic - every efficiency gained and savings achieved are especially important within a year where COVID-19 greatly impacted our civic finances.”

2020 SSS Report financial highlights include:

An estimated $850K in operational savings were identified through a combination of one-time overall and annual savings.
Saskatoon Land generated $43.7 million in sales and leasing revenues. Financial returns from Land Development operations stay in Saskatoon and are allocated for use in capital projects that would otherwise be funded through property taxes or borrowing.
Grant funding approvals totaled $69.8 million through a combination of federal and provincial programs.

The annual SSS Report provides highlights to City Council and the community at large on the City’s previous year’s accomplishments related to our Strategic Goal of Continuous Improvement through improved service, increased savings and found efficiencies, and successful sustainability initiatives across civic operations.

The 2020 Report on Service, Savings and Sustainability report will be presented to the Governance and Priorities Committee of City Council today, Monday July 19.