Municipal governments first determine whether to increase or decrease taxes based on input from administration personnel who offer advice to council members.
This advice is considered when council holds budget meetings and consults with members of the public as well as considering any project that a council member might wish to have funded.
Once a dollar figure has been determined, then council instructs administration to adjust the tax rate, which used to be called “the mill rate,” to reflect the increase or decrease that council has agreed upon.
Salmon Arm, our neighbour, experienced an average of an 11 per cent increase in their B.C. assessment notices and after taking into consideration all of the input that council received, decided to increase their taxes by 1.5 per cent.
Kamloops’ assessment notices were increased in the nine per cent range and council increased their taxes by two per cent.
Other towns and villages in B.C. have also adjusted their tax rate to reflect the increase or decrease in property taxes they charge their citizens.
Only here in Chase do we have a council that appears not to understand this simple tax concept because they wrongly used the assessment rate increase, an average of 15 per cent, to justify a very large increase in our taxes.
It is true that local council does not control assessment increases or decreases, but they do have full control on the tax rate they impose on citizens.
Can you imagine what council would do if next year the assessments went down by 25 per cent?
Rae Semple
@SalmonArm
newsroom@saobserver.net
Like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter