Better understanding Municipal Taxes in the Crowsnest Pass

Its amazing how politicians positions change before and after an election!

During the campaign there was several candidates that stated they would not support a tax increase, one candidate stated on his literature that he would never support a tax increase, another stated that he would vote as close as possible to zero.

Then the first budget comes along and to our surprise it includes a tax increase, yes I sat in those council meeting and there was three people that voted against that increase but to his credit (Saindon) was the only one that spoke against it, very easy to vote against something and not say a word because its going through anyway.

Now the heat turns up a little bit because there was a tax increase, and because of the wonderful part of the equation called market assessment I have heard of some people being as high as 10%.

Then as I have raised a number of times we all know that during the budget process a number of new positions were created, with the old trick of building in the wages for 12 months knowing full well that the budget does not get passed before April, they are just filling those jobs now so there was at least four months of wages not used, the Foreman's job is still being advertised so that is not going to be filled for at least two more months.

So now the politicians are blaming the province for a tax increase, due to the ASFF and the Seniors Housing increasing their requisitions. Well everybody that been on or around council knows that happens every year. Councilor Mitchell saw that the last three years, I stressed during the election that it was important to have some experienced councilors on the next council for this very type of reason. But one of the present councilors basically stated that, that was nonsense experience was not such a important factor.

Never the less when the ASFF went up by $175,000 and the seniors went up by $18,000 the council had an option they could have taken the dollars saved on wages above and offset those increases, they choice to on the seniors side which will save the average tax payer a whopping $5 this year. But the real issue the ASFF they choose to ignore.

Anyway back to the tax increase they wish to now say the dollars they pick up from Joe Blow taxpayer did not increase this year that its all the provinces (ASFF) fault, its their portion that went up.

Well lets give them some slack here and compare apples to apples lets look at the number of dollars raised by General Municipal Taxation lets put aside the ASFF and the Seniors housing. Where do we find that information? Go to the Mill rate bylaw on the municipal web site. Below is an example from 2009 Bylaw 777 under the whereas you will see a line like the one below it shows the amount of dollars collected by General Municipal Taxation.

"Example 2009 Bylaw 777
WHEREAS, the estimated municipal revenues and transfers from all sources other than taxation is

estimated at $14,354,981, and the balance of $6,360,015 is to be raised by general municipal taxation;

In 2008 the number was $6,277,689
In 2009 the number was $6,360,015
In 2010 the number was $6,432,821
In 2011 the number is $6,555,990

So lets do the math 2009 increased by $82,326.
2010 increased by $72,806.
2011 increased by $123,169

Wow the general taxation went up this year by almost $50,000 more than the previous year, I hope we don't see zero tax increases like this every year. Based on the above numbers previous council did not do so bad.

Then other questions come up, a lot of which have already been pointed out by the commenter's on my blog.
Despite only increasing general taxation last year by $72,806 council managed to do the following:
$450,000 back into reserves
$350,000 surplus
$250,000 equipment purchase out of the municipal budget.

This year despite increasing general taxation by a whopping $123,169 council will manage to do the following:
$100,000 into reserves
Virtually zero surplus except what will be created by putting all those new wages in the budget that will only be used for a portion of the year.
$530,000 in debt taken on to purchase new equipment.


One last point I have heard comments being thrown around regarding reserves and the way they were previously and abused, I have stated before I did not always agree with every Infrastructure project the municipality did, but I would challenge any of the present council to point out a project we should not have spent those reserves on which projects were unnecessary.