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Property taxes are going up again in Vancouver next year — but not by as much as originally forecast.
The city’s $2.15 billion draft 2024 operating budget, heading to council on Dec. 5, proposes a tax hike of 7.6 per cent.
That’s equivalent to about $98 per year on an average condo, and $168 on an average single-family home.
“I think this draft budget does demonstrate that staff have worked extremely hard to get the property tax increase that’s proposed to the lowest amount possible,” ABC Vancouver Coun. Peter Meiszner told Global News.
“Last summer they were predicting close to 9.5 per cent … I think in a really challenging fiscal environment, shaving off two percentage points is very good work by staff.”
According to the draft budget, the tax hike will break down as 1 per cent for infrastructure renewal, 2.8 per cent to boost the Vancouver Police Department budget, and 3.8 per cent for other city services.
It eschews major service cuts, with funding to complete the hiring of 100 new police officers ABC pledged in the 2022 election, “enhanced mental health support” envisioned as a part of ABC’s still-incomplete pledge to hire 100 mental health nurses, the addition of 22 new firefighters and council’s plan to revitalize Chinatown.
Last year, Vancouver homeowners faced a property tax increase of 10.7 per cent.
“The mayor and our ABC caucus really made a promise to Vancouverites that we were not going to see a property tax increase like that again,” Mesizner said.
Earlier this fall, council approved a suite of fee increases on everything from business and trades licences to parking permits and exotic bird licences aimed at shaving points off the property tax hike.
“It is never good news to bring a tax increase, but I think our staff have really done a pretty good job, Green Coun. Pete Fry said.
Fry compared the tax increases to hikes renters will face this year, pointing out that under the 3.5 per-cent maximum allowable rent increase, a tenant paying $3,000 per month will have to cough up an extra $420 this year — four times the tax hike for a condo owner.
“We do have really significant cost drivers, including a massive infrastructure deficit that we need to catch up on, and we’re starting to see that,” he said.
“A lot of our infrastructure is like grandpa age, and it needs to be renewed otherwise it is going to fail, and as we see climate change increasingly delivering a lot of impacts like excess water, heat damage … it’s becoming a safety issue, and those all cost money.”
The draft operating budget does not incorporate ideas from Mayor Ken Sim’s Mayor’s Budget Task Force.
That initiative, which was announced last spring and given until Oct. 3 to complete its work, is slated to present a final report to council next Tuesday.
“My understanding is that those recommendations are a bit more longer-term,” Mesizner said.
“So they would be improvements we would see over the next couple of years.”
© 2023 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
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