Offstreet Parking Rates and Performing Arts Centre on Council Agenda
Specifically, Council will be asked to approve the new rates, and either push for an April 1st implementation , or a May 1st change date.
The problem is, the final reading on the bylaw would not take place until March 31st, and although no one is likely to complain about a rate change that has them paying less for the balance of the year, those who are renting stalls are supposed to get 30 days notice.
So, a final read on March 31st means no 30 day notice for an April 1st implementation, so a May 1st date would be appreciated for strictly legal reasons.
The rates are being rolled back as too many people complained the increases, which took effect January 1st were too much for most to afford. Councillors Frank Everitt, Lyn Hall and Murry Krause brought the matter back before Council and pressed for a rollback. So instead of the hikes that were, in some cases more than 100%, the rates were boosted by 25% for the second half of the year, and a further 15% to be added in each of the next two years.
Staff say the roll back will mean a loss in budgeted revenue $156,000 this year, a further $69 thousand next year, and about $62,000 in 2016.
Also on the agenda for this evening’s session;
An update on the review of the Performing Arts project. City Manager Beth James says it will be about June before she has a final report that presents more accurate cost estimates as well as a review of the demand for the facility and possible funding options.
Councillor Garth Frizzell will present the final report on the hosting of the Federation of Canadian Municipalities.
The three day event cost a little over $22 thousand, and private donations paid for $15,600 of that bill. Frizzell is asking Council to approve picking up the balance of just under $7 grand for catering costs and materials needed for the FCM huddle a year ago.
Comments
Council says they have no money to fix our aging infrastructure but they seem to have lots of money for parites and other unnecessary stuff.
BRING ON THE ELECTION
Another Party to the List …. add up all the celebration money associated with these bashes you would see some savings in our municipal taxes for sure …every little bit adds up ! That’s what they say about cutting costs ….Starting to believe upper management don’t have a full understanding of viewing financial statements properly. Prince George is really leading the race in high municipal taxes . I will be calling up my realtor soon to relocate to better and cheaper places to live in BC
Try Hixon…:-)
Here is a table for comparative tax rates in BC presented by your favorite realtor. 2010 list. Maybe someone can find a more recent one.
http://www.buyric.com/vancouver/2011/12/bc-residential-home-property-tax-cost-comparison-2010-288/4957
PG is pretty far down the list for having the highest property taxes in BC
Yes, but do I have an ocean view, great shopping, great restraunts, and a safe downtown core? I know that I can stroll Oak Bay in the evenings and feel safe.
The streets of the higher taxed locations are not full of pot holes, or swimming pools, and they have great transportation which PG cannot even pretend to have.
What I find interesting about that list that gus posted the link to, is that the cities above PG are often the ones that PG wants to be like or that people move to. The ones below PG, not so much. Just an anecdotal observation. Interpret it as you wish.
this page has more up to date stats
http://www.cscd.gov.bc.ca/lgd/infra/statistics_index.htm
There are close to 50 communities in BC which had higher property taxes and charges in 2013….
bunch of whiners in this community that want to live in a chit hole and then complain when other communities look better and they do not understand how one has to pay to live in a place that cares.
Bang on, gus.
What about our Senior Citizens who are trying to stay in their house as long as they can? Pretty hard to do with tax increases the way they are going?
Gus. You are getting pretty full of yourselve.
Who gives a Chit what other municipalties pay for taxes. That is nothing more than a red herring, there are many extenuating circumstances surrounding the tax issue, like commercial, and industrial taxes, etc;
We have more firemen, and police per capita than some of the comparable cities. We in all probability have more city staff per capita.
Lets get off this bullshit about local taxes, and look at the amount of revenue spent by this city on per capita basis as compared to other cities. Do that and you might (might) then start to get a sense of what the hell is going on,. Do some comparing in regards to the amount of property we have sitting idle for years and years for which we paid millions of dollars. Check out where the money from the sale of city property goes.
Check out how many millions of dollars that have been spent on various City projects like garbage, city yards and offices, moving tennis courts, sprucing up the PG Golf and Curling club, etc; etc; etc;.
Check out all sources of revenue ie; gambling, RCMP fine money, Gas Tax Revenue, etc; and you will see without a doubt how this city has been wasting millions and millions of dollars.
That bloody Police Station is a prime example of a City gone mad. There are many other fiasco’s like the Community Energy System, and the purchase of the CN building on 1st Ave. by IPG. Plus the high cost of IPG itself.
When you compare taxes, be sure to include all the other costs, like water, sewer, garbage, snow, road rehab utility, etc; Then compare what we get for this money, which in our case is
1. Lousy stinking potholed roads.
2. Busting leaking water mains
3. Piss poor snow removal
4. Recreation facilities that have not had any significant maintenance for years.
5. Selling off assets to try and generate more money to look after vested interest groups like the Performing Arts Society.
When it comes to wasting money, Prince George is a leader. In any other areas they are somewhat wanting.
$22,000 for a three day meeting…must be some pretty good things happening there to justify that kind of expense?? At least private donations [not some other arm of govt] are picking up a big piece of the pie.
A little simple math will show West Van, the most expensive taxed place in BC pays less tax than PG per $1,000.00 of value by a whole bunch.
A West Van 1.4 million dollar property pays just over $7,000.00 while a $200,000.00 property in PG pays $3000.00 or 42% of what the 1.4 million dollar property owner pays yet the value of the West Van property is 7 times the value of the PG property.
So who really gets the better deal?
Palopu -couldn’t agree with you more.
Do people realize the figures etc. that were recently given to the city were from 2006-2008?
Why was the PAC group not working on updating this information instead of letting the rest of the taxpayers pay for city administration to update?
They could have at least done some more research that does not cost anything except for their time. There goes their volunteer process!
Their figures show closer to 700,000 to operate. I do not care if this amount includes private donations etc. If down the road we as a city could be looking at costs of more than 300,000 as mentioned in the “views” article.
As for paying higher/lower taxes – what happens down south is like comparing apples to oranges. This comparing is a scapegoat for the city and others.
To be fair, West Van has minimal snow costs compared to us. Doubt they’re trying to unthaw their drains right now. Also, they have higher population density per acre – i.e., more people paying taxes. If we had 300,000 people living in high rises and condo projects in PG, our per thousand cost would drop because more people are paying for the same infrastructure. Which is one of the nice things about PG, is you can still afford a single family dwelling.
Resident: “A little simple math will show West Van, the most expensive taxed place in BC pays less tax than PG per $1,000.00 of value by a whole bunch.”
Here’s where you went wrong and it goes dowhill from there. Using assessed value is meaningless because costs are fixed… putting aside inflated GVRD assessed values.
I’ve said this many times before, if your house was assessed at $1,000 or $1,000,000 it doesn’t matter because the city will adjust the mill rates to extract what it needs.
Well said palopu, the only way Gus could be more full of himself is if he gained some weight. He is ignorant to the real world.
The city and council are wasting millions of dollars and yet want more.. Talk about ignorance
JB …. most, not all, on here are unable to understand how a comparison can be made among the BC municipalities with respect to property taxes plus utility charges.
One might have a chance if they were together in a room and could be shown the various calculations which could be made. This is not the medium to do that in.
I am amazed that the City, IPG and some of those involved in getting people to move to PG do not work on putting together an awareness “package” of sort on the web to show various calculations.
I have not doubt that this City “wastes” money in some areas. By that I mean that whether it is road maintenance or distributing grants, or running recreation facilities, etc. they may be running effectively or efficiently in some areas and the complete opposite in other areas.
I repeat myself, I thought that the KPMG study would be dealing with that, but they did not have the expertise on hand on our project to deal with it.
I am waiting for the BC Municipal Auditor to start comparing road maintenance in the major urban areas to each other using such criteria as lane.km of building, surface maintenance, snow removal/cm of snowfall.
Nobody in admin or council here has the interest or mindset to do that.
One should go to view a couple of council meetings at wood buffalo in Alberta (Ft. McMurray) to see the difference with a council that understands and ours that does not.
All I can say is, the city has no problems raising our taxes at a rate greater than COLA. What does this mean. it means that the city has no control over its expenses.
We simply have too many people in our city hall. Attrition…. this is the opportunity to do it. We don’t mind expecting less.
What we need to do is start selling off some of the real estate the city owns. and start controlling tax increases.
Leave Pine Valley for the later half of the century. But we have an opportunity to get rid of some of these properties downtown.
Hmmm… Prince George a chite hole? I don’t know about the rest of you, but I am starting to get a complex about living here.
It also doesn’t help when Prince George is described as the “armpit of BC” by a Vancouver radio talk show host, who was unimpressed that Elton John would have a concert here in PG and not Vancouver. I think he also called us knuckle dragging Neanderthals.
So if we are all living in the “armpit of BC” are we not just armpit hairs? ;-)But on the other hand, there are some days when Prince George does smell like an arm pit. Hmmm… makes a person think deep thoughts…
Why do people use the term “unthaw” ? Noticed it several times lately and had to laugh whenever I see it. You thaw your frozen pipes , if you unthaw them aren’t you just freezing them all over again ? If you undo something you are returning it to the state it was in to begin with!
Posted by: Walter198 on March 10 2014 8:32 AM
Yes, but do I have an ocean view, great shopping, great restraunts, and a safe downtown core? I know that I can stroll Oak Bay in the evenings and feel safe.
The streets of the higher taxed locations are not full of pot holes, or swimming pools, and they have great transportation which PG cannot even pretend to have.
If Walter is referring to the better life in Victoria he needs to be reminded that one thing that helps pay for the great infrastructure he enjoys is the fact that the cost to treat his sewage is ZERO. Prince George does not have to “pretend” to have a state-of-the-art treatment system. It’s been operating for decades while our capital city spews its crap into the ocean to the embarrassment of the rest of the country.
We have to remember that Victoria has taken the step to collect the sewage at the buildings, carry it through a network of pipes, manholes, check valves, etc. some distance into the ocean.
That is a far cry from dumping sewage collected in buckets from the highest windows of the buildings to the gutters of the sidewalks or travelled road surface. :-)
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