City property taxes. City property tax hikes. You’re in for a shocker – 6.4 per cent.
Didn’t sound like a high temperature story earlier in the week. Didn’t set the world on fire.
What was up with that?
While there was all the argy-bargy over the Green Line, there was some other fun and games going on at a place often nicknamed the Cowtown Kremlin.
City hall.
“They’re burying the number,” says Coun. Sonya Sharp.
“The new way of budgeting is burying the numbers. Any smart person who reads the report can find in the executive summary in one of the attachments the numbers are there.”
“So when the mayor says: Oh, I’m so happy everyone decided to go with the new way of budgeting it’s a new creative way to make sure the numbers seem lower than they are.”
“That is, until you get your next tax bill.”
Hmmm … the councillor talks about a 6.4 per cent tax increase for Calgary residents?
Where is that?
The city hall main report? Looking.
Attachment 1 to the city hall main report.
Not there.
Attachment 2 … looking, looking.
Attachment 3 … Page 1 … looking, looking …
Page 2 … there it is.
6.4% residential tax increase. Ouch.
The councillor figures city hall should have put that 6.4 per cent somewhere in big letters.
Like that’s going to happen.
Why didn’t those who should know better talk about this 6.4 per cent number?
“Because, Rick, they know no one reads past page one.”
In fact, some press reports echoed the city’s official line and swallowed the city’s spin.
Where was the 6.4 per cent tax hike number in the stories about the upcoming budget?
Meanwhile in the city hall documents the higher-ups at the Cowtown Kremlin say clearly they want to spend “beyond council’s direction to maintain the previously approved increase.”
They say it’s the growth of population and inflation caused spending “to fall out of line.”
They always have a reason for spending “to fall out of line.”
Boom, bust it doesn’t matter. There is always a reason to spend more.
The city bigwigs talk about pressures and how this will affect “citizen satisfaction.”
Dear city taxpayers, it’s your fault! You really want a big tax hike.
Then the city hall mucky-mucks pull off the old trick that’s been used so many times before.
Depending on the year, they pick something or some things we all agree need dollars.
Then they suggest if citizens don’t give them the tax hike they want these important things won’t get the attention they need and all hell will break loose.
This move distracts people from pointing out areas where the city can cut.
Surprise, surprise, the city hall big shots needs more money.
So they recommend 0.9 per cent above the previously approved property tax increase of 3.6 per cent.
That’s not 6.4 per cent.
Ah, they are so clever.
For you accountants out there, help your friends out with this one.
The city takes your tax hike and puts it together with the much lower tax hike for business properties and comes up with a smaller and largely meaningless number.
At the time Coun. Dan McLean went on X and stated in no uncertain terms: “The city is proposing a 6.4 per cent residential property tax hike on top of the last three yearly increases.”
McLean says Mayor Jyoti Gondek was not amused.
Coun. Sonya Sharp is asking questions.
“Why aren’t we coming up with the straight goods?”
After all, eventually someone would have tripped over that 6.4 per cent number.
And by the way, this tax hike doesn’t include increases to water and recycling rates.
“Now it’s our job, those of us on council who are more fiscally diligent to go through and say this is too much,” says Sharp.
“We need to stop saying we can’t do more with less.”
Sharp worked 20 years at city hall and just might know where the bodies are buried.
This is just the beginning. The city hall budget will be debated in November.
City hall blames previous councils for being too conservative.
Yes, at Calgary city hall, former mayor and now NDP leader Naheed Nenshi is seen by far too many as too conservative.
And now there are city council members wanting to score some love for their pet causes from the city hall cheque-writing machine.
Others on council will pretend to be fiscal hawks, all of sudden pretending to care about taxpayers, because there is a city election next year.
As for that hide-and-seek on the 6.4% property tax increase few Calgarians know about.
Dan McLean knows what’s up with city hall.
“They don’t want you to know what the tax hike is,” he says.
“They certainly don’t want you to be asking questions about what we can cut and where we can save.”