City Councillors Dispute Property Tax Increases

At the City Council meeting of September 15th, Councillors considered the proposed Process for Creation of the City's 2026 budget, including the scheduling, utility rates and most controversially... baseline property tax rates. There was a general discussion of business taxes, about how they are determined. Businesses selling liquor have the highest license fees as is the case in most municipalities, it was explained. And there is an upper limit of what fees can be applied, according to the Chief Administrative Officer. Mayor Patrick Johnstone said that fees are developed to be in line with surrounding municipalities, and in fact, they reduced liquor fees this year because New Westminster was charging more than the neighbouring cities. Councillor Ruby Campbell said that there had been a few meetings about business taxes and there were well-considered. It was the property tax issue that resulted in some widely divergent opinions and a fulsome discussion by the councillors. Councillor Daniel Fontaine started the debate. He put forward a addendum to the main motion on adopting the City Staff's Budget 2026 Process, to have staff put forward a plan showing tax baseline rates at 0% increase in taxes and 2.5% increases in taxes. The baseline tax rate in the initial report indicated a tax rate increase of a little over 5% . As was pointed out by the Finance Director, that is to cover only existing costs and contracts, with no new projects considered. There was considerable discussion on the impact of inflation and also the importance of keeping the many services that the city provides. With a low tax rate, there would be many lost. Councillors Fontaine and Minhas felt that there should be some substantial cuts. The addendum to the Motion was passed unanimously, as all felt it would be a good exercise to see what the impact of low tax rate would be.