Despite changes to property tax revenues over three years, staff aren’t anticipating any issues.
Council voted to write off more than $150,100 in property taxes and related interest for 2021, 2022 and 2023, during its regular meeting on Nov. 21.
According to a report by Jackie Syme, manager of revenue services, changes in assessment values that happened after the taxes were imposed led to six applications for tax write-offs including: five that were no longer liable for the rate at which they were taxed and one destroyed by fire or demolished after the return of roll.
Those followed seven applications earlier in the year totalling more than $15,740, which council approved to be written off on Sept. 5.
While write-offs are a routine matter, “the higher than usual write-off amount at this time,” is the result of another government body purchasing land, giving it a different tax rate, Syme explained in the report.
During the meeting, Mayor James Leduc clarified that was mostly Ontario's Ministry of Transportation acquiring land for road and highway projects.
Of the total amount, staff said about $91,080 is from the town and police portions, which have already been factored into the 2023 operating budget.
The remaining amount is from education and upper-tier municipal levies and is recoverable from the County of Simcoe and the province respectively, according to staff.
Council approved the write-offs without further discussion.
Later in the meeting, committee of the whole recommended council approve a new policy for dealing with property tax write-offs, based on a separate report by Syme.
Previously, the town had no official policy for dealing with applications for property tax exemptions under sections 357 or 358 of the Municipal Act, according to the report, and instead followed a combination of wording under the act, industry best practices and internal guidelines.
“The development and approval of this policy is a prudent measure to ensure that these provisions ... continue to be followed in a fair, transparent and consistent manner,” Syme said in the report.
She also noted the new policy would only allow commercial and industrial properties to be eligible for write-offs for repairs or renovations under Section 357(g) of the Act.
Committee made the recommendation without discussion.
Further to that policy, committee also recommended council approve sending to the province’s Assessment Review Board (ARB) any applications for property tax write-offs made under Section 357(1)(d.1) as a result of sickness or extreme poverty.
In another separate report, Syme noted that the town does not have any applications of that nature pending and that staff don’t have much experience with them, nor an established process in place to evaluate them.
Unlike other types of tax write-offs, applications based on sickness or extreme poverty are not administrative in nature and would require the applicant to disclose “significant” personal health and/or financial information, according to the report, as the applications would need to be presented to council in a staff report and/or presented by the applicants during the public meeting of council.
“This could be difficult for some individuals who would rather not have their personal health or financial situation publicly known even though they would like their application approved and voice heard by members of council,” Syme said in the report.
Should council deny a resident’s application, the resident would still have the ability to appeal to the ARB, at which hearings are confidential.
There would be no additional cost to either the town or the applicants to send the applications to the ARB in the first place, according to Syme.
Committee made the recommendation without discussion.
Recommendations from the committee are considered for approval at the next regular council meeting.
