Publish the debt repayment plans
Before the town borrows, show the plan to pay it back. Every year, show what we owe and when it ends.
What it is, in plain language
Borrowing is not automatically bad. A town that never borrows never builds anything, and some assets genuinely should be paid for by the people who use them over the decades they last. What matters is whether the plan to pay it back is written down, public, and honest about what it costs.
This proposal would require two things. Before council approves new debt, a one-page repayment plan goes on the public agenda: how much, for what, at what rate, what the annual payment is, and the year it is fully paid off. And once a year, the town publishes a plain-language debt report: every loan we carry, what is left on it, what it costs us this year, and how close that puts us to the limits we have set for ourselves.
None of this requires new studies or new spending. The town already produces every one of these numbers for the province in its annual Financial Information Return. This is a decision to show residents the same numbers, in a form they can read.
Why this one
Three things in the public record convinced me this is worth writing down.
The town set itself a target of zero, and the number has moved a long way since. Council’s 2020 Strategic Plan, reproduced in the 2020 budget, said the goal was to work toward the lowest debt possible, with a target of zero. I can find no public decision since that revisited it.
What the audited books show is that debt fell for two years and then turned. Long-term debt stood at $11,697,451 at the end of 2023 and $10,588,193 at the end of 2024. Note 17 of the 2024 financial statements lists all seven loans, with the lender, the interest rate, and the maturity date on each. Since then the town added $1,838,970 to an existing loan in March 2025 and took on $2,458,850 of new financing in March 2026.
The mayor has publicly put the current total at about $20 million, up from about $11 million in 2024, and says more than $8 million of that is road repairs, catching up on a backlog after years of very little work. I have no reason to doubt any of that, and the roads argument is a real one. Borrowing to fix roads at today’s prices rather than tomorrow’s is a defensible call, and I would probably have voted for a good deal of it.
Here is the part that bothers me. You can look up the 2024 figure yourself, in an audited statement, with every loan itemized. You cannot do that for the $20 million. It appears in a Facebook post, not in any document the town publishes on a schedule. A resident who wants to know what Cochrane owes today, what it costs us this year, and when it is paid off has nowhere to look. That is not a complaint about the number. It is the reason for this proposal.
We are running close to our own ceiling. Cochrane’s debt policy sets a self-imposed limit: debt service costs should not exceed 10 per cent of revenues. The 2023 projections had us at 9.0 per cent in 2022 and creeping up year over year, touching 9.7 per cent by 2027. That is inside the limit, which is the point of having one. But a town operating a few tenths of a percentage point from its own ceiling should be saying so out loud, every year, in public.
The water plan alone forecasts a large increase. The Water Financial Plan that came to council in September 2025 forecasts the water-related long-term debt balance rising from about $2.5 million at the end of 2025 to $28 million over the plan period, with a significant portion of the new borrowing expected in 2026, modelled at a 4 per cent interest rate. That may well be the right call for the infrastructure involved. It is also the kind of number residents should not have to find on page 116 of a council agenda.
There is a fourth thing, and it is smaller but telling. The town’s Debt Management and Capital Financing Policy still explains its borrowing limits using the 2014 annual repayment limit, calculated from the 2013 Financial Information Return. That same paragraph was still being reproduced in council agendas in 2025. The policy is not wrong in principle. It is just twelve years stale, and nobody has been required to refresh it.
- 2020 Budget, By-Law 1416-2020, debt target on p. 33
- 2024 Financial Statements, term loans and long-term debt at Note 17
- Jan 27, 2026 agenda, 2024 audited financial statements, Note 17 on p. 208
- June 16, 2026 agenda, Report 2026-46 on loan renewals, p. 23
- Feb 27, 2023 budget meeting, debt projections on p. 27
- Sept 23, 2025 agenda, Water Financial Plan, debt on p. 116
- FI-007 Debt Management and Capital Financing Policy
The draft bylaw
By-law No. ____ · Town of Cochrane · DRAFT FOR DISCUSSION
A by-law respecting the publication of debt repayment plans and an annual debt report
Whereas the Corporation of the Town of Cochrane may incur long-term debt for capital purposes in accordance with the Municipal Act, 2001 and O. Reg. 403/02; and
Whereas the Town already compiles information respecting its long-term debt, debt servicing costs, and annual repayment limit in the ordinary course of preparing its budget and its Financial Information Return; and
Whereas Council considers it in the public interest that residents be able to understand, in plain language and before a decision is taken, what the Town proposes to borrow and how it intends to repay it;
Now therefore the Council of the Corporation of the Town of Cochrane enacts as follows:
1. Repayment plan required before new debt
No by-law authorizing new long-term debt shall be given first reading unless a Repayment Plan for that debt has been included in the public agenda package for that meeting. The Repayment Plan shall state, on not more than one page:
- the principal amount proposed to be borrowed;
- the capital purpose for which it is to be borrowed;
- the term, and the interest rate or the rate assumption used;
- the estimated annual principal and interest payment;
- the calendar year in which the debt is expected to be fully repaid;
- the effect of the new debt on the Town’s debt service costs as a percentage of revenues, both before and after the proposed borrowing, shown against the limit set in the Town’s debt management policy; and
- the source of funds from which repayment is to be made.
2. Annual debt report
The Treasurer shall prepare, and Council shall receive at an open meeting, an annual Debt Report, published on the Town’s website and available on request in printed form. The Debt Report shall set out, for the most recently completed fiscal year:
- each outstanding debenture, loan, and long-term financial obligation, identified by its purpose and its authorizing by-law;
- the original principal amount and the balance outstanding on each;
- the interest rate and the scheduled final payment year of each;
- total principal and interest paid during the year;
- total debt servicing costs expressed as a percentage of own-source revenues, shown against both the provincial annual repayment limit and any limit set in the Town’s debt management policy; and
- a projection of the total debt balance and debt servicing costs for each of the following five years, on stated assumptions.
3. Plain language and a one-page summary
The Debt Report shall open with a summary of not more than one page, written so that a resident without financial training can understand it, stating in plain terms what the Town owes, what it paid this year, and when the current debt is scheduled to be retired. Where a technical term is unavoidable, a plain-language note shall accompany it.
4. Timing
The Debt Report shall be published no later than [date] each year, and shall note the date on which it was last updated.
5. Keeping the policy current
The Town’s debt management policy shall be reviewed, and updated or reaffirmed by Council, at least once in each term of Council, and the figures used in it to illustrate the Town’s borrowing limits shall be drawn from the most recent Financial Information Return available at the time of review.
6. Existing obligations
Nothing in this by-law affects the validity of any debt incurred before it comes into force. The first Debt Report shall include all such debt then outstanding.
[ Discussion draft. Clauses on emergency borrowing, short-term operating borrowing under section 407 of the Municipal Act, and the treatment of debt held by Town affiliates still need to be worked out. This is a starting point for conversation, not final legal text. ]
A real example, and what was missing
On March 23, 2026, council authorized new long-term financing in open session. Here is what the public record tells you about that decision, laid out against what section 1 of the draft bylaw would require.
| What the bylaw would require | What the March 2026 record shows |
|---|---|
| Principal amount | $2,458,850 |
| Interest rate | 4.42% fixed, five-year term |
| Amortization | 20 years |
| Lender | Desjardins |
| Capital purpose | Not stated in the resolution |
| Annual principal and interest payment | Not stated |
| Year it is fully repaid | Not stated |
| Effect on debt service as a share of revenues | Not stated |
| Source of funds for repayment | Not stated |
Four of the nine are on the record. The rest exist somewhere in the Town’s files, and staff could produce them, but a resident reading the resolution cannot tell what this borrowing will cost per year or when it ends. The resolution also notes it was necessary to secure financing ahead of the borrowing bylaw in order to hold favourable lending terms, which is a reasonable thing to do and a reason the numbers should be in front of council early rather than late.
Worth reading alongside it: the draft 2026 operating budget summary from February states that the budget had not been adjusted for any new long-term debt arising from capital financing. The borrowing came a month later.
- March 23, 2026 Special Council minutes, Resolution 2026-31
- Feb 23, 2026 special council agenda, draft 2026 budget summary on p. 6
What the annual report would look like
| What it paid for | By-law | Original | Still owing | Rate | Paid this year | Paid off in |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Example water treatment upgrade | (sample) | (sample) | (sample) | (sample) | (sample) | 2034 |
| Sample road reconstruction | (sample) | (sample) | (sample) | (sample) | (sample) | 2029 |
| Placeholder facility renewal | (sample) | (sample) | (sample) | (sample) | (sample) | 2041 |
The summary above the table would answer three questions in plain words: what the Town owes in total, what share of our revenue goes to paying it, and how that compares to the limit we set for ourselves.
What this proposal does not do
It does not cap borrowing, and it does not set a debt target. Those are budget decisions, and they belong in a budget debate where the trade-offs against roads, water, and services can be argued openly. A councillor who tells you he can unilaterally set the town’s debt ceiling is overselling what the job is.
What this does is make the decision visible before it is taken, and make the running total visible every year afterward. Council can still choose to borrow. It just has to say, on the record and in advance, how it plans to pay the money back.
Tell me what you’d change
This is a discussion draft, and I mean that. If a requirement here would create real work for staff without telling residents anything useful, I want to hear it, because a reporting rule that burns staff time for no public benefit is a bad rule. Write to me at dan4cochrane@gmail.com.