Mayor Cal Huntley thinks Flin Flon’s special levy will return next year, but no final decision has been made.
The controversial levy, designed to raise taxes on low-end homes, received regulatory approval on a one-year trial basis in 2014.
But in order for the levy to proceed in 2015, city council must apply for and receive permission from the Manitoba Municipal Board.
“We’re talking about it right now,” Huntley said last week when asked if a decision has been made to resume the levy. “I think the special levy’s going to exist in this coming year, but we haven’t made a firm decision, so until we do that, I think that’s the best I can tell you right now.”
Disappointed
Huntley’s statement came as a disappointment to Rose Reimer, the owner of a low-end home whose taxes rose nearly 90 per cent to $763 this year.
“I’m opposed to them bringing back the fee,” she said.
Reimer, 63, said she is most concerned by the impact the levy, combined with rising utility bills, will have on seniors and their fixed incomes.
She said she is grateful to still have the income from her job as a cleaner, but she is not sure whether she will be able to afford to keep her home when she retires in the coming years.
Reimer said it would make more sense for the city to phase in tax and utility increases rather than implementing sudden, more dramatic hikes.
“To me it’s harsh” the way costs went up, she said.
Asked last month whether he supported the special levy, Huntley, then a mayoral candidate, said he would like to further examine the fee and its possible extension “because I believe there are some problems with it.”
Huntley added he would prefer a base tax to the levy. The Manitoba government, however, won’t let municipalities charge a base tax.
As a private citizen in 2012 and 2013, Huntley attended three public meetings to discuss the levy.
“My fear is that the seniors in the uptown area and the South Hudson area [are] going to suffer from this,” Huntley told council in April 2013.
At the same meeting, Huntley said the levy would have the effect of upping taxes on low-end homes while decreasing them on high-end homes – “and I think we should all just realize that that’s what we’re doing.”
Months later, at the Manitoba Municipal Board’s hearing on the levy proposal in August 2013, Huntley said he conditionally supported the fee given that it was being implemented for one year.
At the time, Huntley said reviewing the levy’s impact after a year would be vital to determining where and whether it is inflicting “real pain.”
Huntley added he still had concerns about the impact on low-income residents, who would be “very hurt” if the levy was combined with utility rate increases and a possible broad reassessment of properties.
When Huntley made those statements, no one knew for sure what the precise cost would be for low-end homeowners.
According to the city, while low-end homes faced major increases in percentage terms, the highest single dollar amount was $340.
As defenders of the levy have pointed out, a number of high-end homes have regularly faced larger annual increases than that.
This year, for instance, a homeowner in the Willowvale area reported a tax hike of nearly $900 for a total tax bill in the range of $4,300.
