Starting with an increased base budget and adding on some mandatory expenditures in the first round of budget deliberations has resulted in possible tax increases ranging from just under three to just over nine per cent throughout the Sunshine Coast Regional District (SCRD).
Different areas pay different amounts depending on what services they are involved in, and after round one the possible SCRD increases are as follows: Area A (Pender Harbour/Egmont): 2.92 per cent, Area B (Halfmoon Bay): 4.6 per cent, Area D (Roberts Creek): 4.46 per cent, Area E (Elphinstone): 2.98 per cent, Area F (West Howe Sound): 7.36 per cent, Sechelt Indian Government District: 4.44 per cent, District of Sechelt: 5.99 per cent, Town of Gibsons: 9.15 per cent.
The possible tax increases have not been finalized as the SCRD board still plans to discuss some suggested expenditures in round two, slated for March 9 to 11; however, SCRD board chair Garry Nohr said he doesn’t expect taxes to rise much more. In fact, he said, they may decrease.
“I think we’re at max now,” Nohr told Coast Reporter this week. “In some areas we may have to go back and say ‘hey, I can’t afford that.’ I’m not saying necessarily in my area, but I’m talking overall for different regional areas that were going to put, say, $50,000 into economic development. Maybe they’ll reduce it considerably to bring the taxes down.”
Economic development and recreation are some of the categories that will be discussed during round two.
“We’ll look at upgrades in the rec centres for example. One of the projects is the panels [at the Sechelt Aquatic Centre], which costs $150,000, which we could maybe look at closely to move it to next year’s taxation,” Nohr said.
He explained that necessary increases to this year’s budget, such as the 6.75 per cent BC Hydro increase and the two per cent collective agreement increase greatly affected the proposed taxation rates this year.
In order to raise $177,000, the SCRD must increase taxes by one per cent.
“So what the board is doing is analyzing this very closely and giving it due diligence in keeping it as low as possible,” Nohr said.
He encourages the public to look at the budget packages online at www.scrd.ca to get more details on individual areas and he invites residents to ask questions of their area representative or SCRD staff if they need more clarity.
The SCRD will also present the proposed budget to the Town of Gibsons (March 3 at 7 p.m.), Sechelt Indian Government District (March 4 at 1:30 p.m.) and the District of Sechelt (March 4 at 7 p.m.) as the SCRD tax requisition makes up a portion of what those areas will collect from their constituents.
The SCRD must adopt their budget by March 31.
