P.E.I. municipalities need a bigger share of provincial tax revenues, says Stratford Mayor David Dunphy.

Municipal share of provincial funding has been falling, says Stratford Mayor David Dunphy. (CBC)

Dunphy used Wednesday night's annual town budget meeting to hammer home the significance of repairing what he feels is a broken financial relationship with the province. He said municipalities get less than five per cent of the revenue from provincial taxes, but carry expensive budget items such as water, sewage, and policing.

Dunphy noted that in the past five years the slice of revenue for municipalities from the government has shrunk.

"What I want to see there is [Finance] Minister [Wes] Sheridan and the towns, municipalities come to some kind of a long-term agreement where the funding for the towns and cities is fair,” he said.

Addressing another aspect of his town’s financial relationship with the province, Dunphy said he's still unsure how the introduction of the HST will affect municipalities.

Sewage smell still waits for solution

There was no money in the Stratford budget to fix the town's sewage troubles. The town will wait for new federal infrastructure money before addressing problems with its sewage lagoon next to the Hillsborough Bridge.

The Stratford sewage lagoons can emit foul odours that stink up the surrounding areas. (Pat Martel/CBC)

The plant has had problems for years with foul odours intermittently stinking up the area around it.

But fixing the problem would be expensive and finance chair Randy Cooper said the town is waiting for federal dollars before it tackles big infrastructure projects. The town is also still considering which of two solutions to move ahead with: funneling the sewage to Charlottetown or designing another, bigger sewage plant in the town.

"There are no agreements in place to go one way or the other," said Cooper.

"There are studies to suggest different directions, but we haven't made any decisions. But hopefully we'll have an idea of the direction this year."

Cooper said Stratford is waiting for the federal budget to know what money is available for municipalities.