'Tis the season for town council's to come up with their 2016 capital and operating budgets.

High River Mayor Craig Snodgrass says council has managed to whittle the municipal tax rate way down from where it started.

"Starting out with almost a five-and-a-half per cent tax increase and that did not sit well with us so there's a lot of things that we can do in this town, reducing expenses and all those kinds of things instead of nailing the taxpayer every time we turn around and we got it down to 2.75 (per cent)," the mayor says.

Snodgrass says council wanted to be sensitive to the current economic situation where so many people are out of work.

He says a lot of the capital projects have to do with the aftermath of the flood so they're still being paid for by the Province although a new roof and crosswalk lights are planned for the recreation complex.

Questions, comments, or story ideas? Email us at news@okotoksonline.com