The City of Prince George has its eye on a number of items revealed in Tuesday's federal budget.
Chief among them was the infrastructure announcements, which dipped under the election promise of $10 billion over two years to about $6.8 billion over and above what's already on the books.
Either way, Prince George is ready to get started, said Mayor Lyn Hall.
"We've done a tremendous amount of work prior to this budget in aligning our infrastructure needs and knowing what they are," said Hall, who recently returned from a two-day trip to the capital for meetings with government officials and national associations.
"I think we're a bit ahead of the game. We're just waiting on that process to be defined."
In the first year the government said it will spend $2.7 billion on green infrastructure such as water treatment plants and social infrastructure like seniors homes and public transit.
That shouldn't rule Prince George out, Hall said.
"I think this is something we can key into," he said. "We have the potential of accessing that in year one.
"We've got a priority list of infrastructure needs that we would like to take a look at starting to see whether we can get funding for. We're going to start that process very quickly with the federal government."
That priority list includes moving the snow dump at the foot of 18th Avenue.
"That's a large area that we have and we want to make sure we can reclaim that so we'll see if that falls under the green infrastructure funding."
Under social infrastructure, Hall would hope to include the Four Seasons Leisure Pool upgrade.
"If we take a look at the Elksentre perhaps, the gymnastics building even CN Centre and newer buildings are having an assessment done and we know there will probably need to be work done. The Rolling Mix Concrete Arena is another good one."
While Cariboo-Prince George MP Todd Doherty said Tuesday he feared those dollars would be doled out to bigger cities, Hall didn't necessarily see it that way.
With less money to go around, Hall was asked if he was worried that would unfairly affect smaller communities.
"I don't think so. I think the message was received by the federal government that small communities, mid-sized communities, are in as much a need of infrastructure funding as the large cities are," Hall said.
"I feel confident that we are going to see our share and that we have a fair opportunity to provide our case and we'll receive funding."
Both Doherty and Hall praised the reopening of Prince George's veterans office, one of nine offices to be reinstated.
"That is huge news," said Hall, adding it had been a "key message" the city brought to Ottawa two weeks ago.
"That office is not only great news for Prince George but it's great news for the entire region. It means now that the veterans from all over the north are going to be able to access the services that they so desperately need in a more localized area and a more localized office here in Prince George."
The Liberals also announced $500 million over five years in order to improve broadband coverage in rural and remote communities.
"That's certainly going to assist the region," Hall said.
The city will have to wait until the government provides an application timeline, but Hall said he's hoping to see that in the next month.
"I think the work that has to be done is we need to go from cover-to-cover on the budget. We need to know specifics about the announcements that were made," Hall said.
"When we were out in Ottawa, one of the messages really was: have your projects ready and make sure you're ready to present these when the budget is brought in. And we're ready with these projects."
-- with files from The Canadian Press
