With tariffs just a day away, prices will change this weekend, as Canada has also floated retaliatory tariffs against the U.S.
This would increase the cost of any product imported over the border, which could impact some of the nicer purchases that businesses or other organizations make.
With so much uncertainty over what will actually result from those tariffs, Estevan Mayor Tony Sernick says they'll wait to see what exactly is affected.
"We'll wait and see what the actual tariffs are. I know you listen to the news right now, it's tariff, tariff, tariff, right? So I'm kind of more sit back with that, you know, we'll wait and see what the tariffs actually are when they come in and deal with them then. So that's about all I can say for now, like I said. I'm not gonna get into speculation of what could be. We'll play it by ear and take her as it comes."
For the big capital projects such as finishing up the Downtown Revitalization Project, Sernick is pretty sure that the majority of costs would not be affected by any counter-tariffs.
"Don't hold me to this, but I am pretty sure everything is already kind of bought and paid for, but whether it comes across the line, I'm not sure. Really I know all the paving stones, cause kind of what's left is just what you see on top, right? The cosmetic side of things, the paving stones and the trees are going to be the big thing, but I'm not 100 per cent where they are, but again I'm pretty sure that everything has already been bought and paid for."
One sector of potential trade disruptions is in the energy sector, with the U.S. discussing including oil among their tariffs and discussions of blocking energy exports on the Canadian side taking place.
Sernick says that the industry should stay as open as possible between the two trading partners.
"One thing I don't like is what I heard is, you know, we're going to shut energy off. That's one thing you hear and that concerns me more than a tariff coming in actually, right? So just our lovely, lovely federal government playing with our energy like that. But it's funny how at one time it was dirty Saskatchewan and dirty Alberta oil like a flick of the switch turned into Canadian energy all of a sudden."
"So that is part of the concern, because if we shut our energy off to the US as a counter-attack on the tariff or whatever it is, that's really going to hurt us here, like if our production gets shut in, then we all lose our jobs, right? So we definitely don't want that. So hopefully cooler heads prevail and we can come to an agreement with our trading partner for sure."