CRAIK—Taxpayers in Craik, last Thursday had the chance to learn about proposed changes to Craik’s property tax system.
Craik town council had a public meeting to tell citizens about its intention to reform the property tax system to make it fairer for all property owners.
At its Feb. 15 meeting, Craik council approved, in principle, the implementation of a base property tax of $700 per year with a mill rate of 5.5. These rates will be applied to every residential property in town so that all properties are taxed the same.
If approved the change will increase municipal taxes for people who pay the lowest property taxes—mostly on vacant lots and older houses. People who pay the highest property taxes—those with newer houses—will see a reduction in their tax bills.
Currently Craik uses a minimum tax system.
Craik Mayor David Ashdown said the minimum tax system was implemented a number of years ago to discourage speculation and to encourage owners of vacant properties to make improvements and develop the lots. Ashdown said the minimum tax does not seem high enough to have this intended effect. He said it also does nothing to encourage people to make improvements to their properties that are close to the minimum tax because larger, improved homes receive higher assessment values resulting in higher property taxes.
The tax reforms were initiated after a delegation of 10 homeowners attended council’s meeting in December raising their concerns that due to reassessment, which is done every four years by the Saskatchewan Assessment Management Agency (SAMA), their property taxes went up considerably. The delegation consisted of people who own newer homes in the town. Ashdown said assessments went up on new properties while assessments went down on older home.
When it set the 2017 mill rate Ashdown said council tried to offset the increase in assessment values by lowering the mill rate from 13.85 to 12.85.
“It helped,” Ashdown said, but he said some property owners had a substantial increase.
“If you have 10 homeowners in a town our size coming forward with a concern you have to listen to them.”
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