HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 1992-01-15, Page 12PAGE 12. THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 15,1992.
Province could be big winner as farm assessment drops
Continued from page 1
won’t be passed on to farmers.
In addition, while farmers will
save taxes on their farmland, they
will have to pay more taxes on their
residence. In Morris township, for
instance, the taxes on an average
farm will drop $142, of which half,
$71 would be a saving to the farm
owner. However, taxes on the aver
age home in Morris would increase
by $135. (For detailed information
on al area municipalities see
accompanying table).
The increase which hit urban
municipalities particularly hard,
brought calls from many urban
councillors for an exploration of
some method of phasing in the
increases. Goderich Deputy-reeve
Bill Clifford pointed out that when
the county agreed to be the first
county in Ontario to accept total
market value assessment in 1988, at
least part of the reason was because
the province had offered a system
of transitional grants, designed to
cushion the blow to those who
would see a dramatic increase in
their taxes. At that time it was rural
municipalities that were hard hit by
market-value assessment with
farmland prices still reflecting the
remnants of the late 1970's escala
tion of farmland prices.
Today the province does not
offer the same transitional grants
but provisions in Bill 165 now
before the Ontario Legislature,
would allow municipalities, school
boards and upper-tier governments
to phase in such changes. Council
lor Clifford introduced a motion to
have the county form a committee
to explore phasing in with the
school boards. The legislation,
however, cannot be passed before
the Legislature resumes in March
and the revised assessment notices
are due to be mailed to Huron prop
erty owners and tenants by Feb. 3
so that a series of open houses can
be held for taxpayers between Feb.
10 and 17 and revised assessment
rolls can be delivered to municipal
clerks and treasurers by March 3.
Hullett Reeve Tom Cunningham
argued against phasing in of the
new assessments. He admitted that
the transitional grants in 1988 made
accepting the market value assess
ment plan more palatable for rural
municipalities and he said he sym
pathized with the plight of urban
municipalities now, but "any
buffering now stands to be on the
backs of other municipalities (not
the province)." He said that looking
at what was happening to farm
prices in 1988, "we felt we would
be a winner four years down the
road and we were right." After see
ing the potential savings for farm
ers, he said, he would find it
difficult not to support anything
that would delay swift implementa
tion of the changes.
Exeter Reeve Bill Mickle wor
ried about the wild swings in taxa
tion costs. "We're fighting enough
in this county to try to keep
increasing the tax base," he said.
"This kind of change may deter
people from coming." He said he'd
like to see a smoother flow in tax
increases or decreases.
But Hay Township Reeve, and
former warden, Lionel Wilder
could summon little sympathy for
residential property owners. "In
1988 the Township of Hay got
nailed pretty damned hard and
there was not one word of sympa
thy," he said.
Usbome Reeve Pat Down noted
Snowarama raises
Despite the less than favourable
weather conditions and a shorter
run of good trails, there were 65
riders participating in the Bruce
Regional/Easter Seals Snowarama
at Brussels on Sunday. Through
pledges and donations a total of
$4120 was raised for physically
disabled children.
In Celebration of Ontario’s 200th Anniversary, Heirloom Publishing Inc. and
The Citizen present
that the phasing in in 1988 was
through provincial money, not by
the other municipalities.
Mr. Bellchamber pointed out that
the shift is not so much between
one municipality and another this
time around, but from farms, com
mercial and industrial within each
municipality to residential proper
ties in the municipality.
Wingham Reeve Ian Moreland, a
member of the audience for the pre
sentation, urged council to consider
deferring the implementation of the
new assessment for a year, or phas
ing it in. His town had already been
hit by the closing of two major
industries and the blow to home
owners would be huge, he said.
Councillor Clifford said he didn't
want to turn this into a rural-urban
split but urged a look at phasing in.
$4120
About 50 miles of groomed trail,
from Brussels to the other side of
Brodhagen and back, was runnable,
though conditions were deteriorat
ing by the day's end. With areas
from Quebec to Northern Michigan
reporting no snow, organizers were
pleased with the success of the
event.
But Reeve Wilder said the rural-
urban split wasn't created by the
council, but by the assessment sys
tem. He wondered why reassess
ment couldn't be done every year,
instead of every four years, to
lessen the swings.
Mr. Morgan said his office was
using all its resources just to pre
pare a report every four years, let
alone every year.
Lossie Fuller, Deputy-reeve of
Exeter, argued that the study into
phasing in should be undertaken
just to give council more time to
digest the information which most
councillors had seen for the first
time that afternoon.
In the end, the motion to set up a
committee to study phasing in the
increases was defeated in a record
ed vote by a 17-15 count. Local
reeves voting against a study of
phasing in were: Tom Cunning
ham, Hullett; Norm Fairies, How-
ick; Doug Fraser, Morris; Bob
Hallam, West Wawanosh; Marie
Hicknell, McKillop; Dave Lee,
Blyth; Brian McBumey, Tumberry;
Ernie Snell, East Wawanosh, Bill
Vanstone, Colborne and Gord
Workman, Brussels. Supporting a
study of phasing in the changes was
Leona Armstrong, Grey.
Most candidate site owners
agree to allow testing
Enough owners of land in the
candidate sites for a Huron County
Landfill have signed agreements to
allow testing that the testing can go
ahead, Huron County Council was
told at its meeting Thursday.
In discussion of the report of the
Waste Management Steering com
mittee, Grey township reeve Leona
Armstrong noted that 21 or 29
effected landowners in her town
ship had signed agreements to
allow the testing to proceed to see
if the sights have suitable condi
tions to allow use as a landfill site.
Nigel Bellchamber, county clerk
administrator noted that that num
ber had been tabulated before
Christmas and more agreements
have since been signed.
Denis Merrall, county engineer
noted that most of those who had
refused to sign the agreements were
owners of land that made up only a
small portion of the site. This may
not cause a problem because
enough testing can be done on the
larger portions of the sites to give
an accurate indicator, he said.
Mr. Merrall said that the recep
tion given to Joanne Richter, the
co-ordinator of the project, had
been good when she approached
most property owners. He said
there had been a delay with the
signing of the agreement for the
Goderich township site because
there was an estate involved.
Hay Township Reeve Lionel
Wilder wondered how many dollars
would be spent in testing the
Goderich site since from what he
had seen, "there's about the same
likelihood of it being chosen as a
site in Siberia".
Committee Chairman Tom
Tomes said the consultants just
needed permission for agricultural
soil testing. It's not likely boring of
test holes, the expensive form of
testing, will be carried out.
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