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"3lllllllfBlllEC3b . 1lllluilllls1lro School .J/ "ii/ri/iii))))') Sole "They may have said there are tools to offset this, well the tools only delay the inevitable," said Seiling. "And the tools only work if there's enough money to make them work Selling recognizes it's been a long complaint of the business community in the province that they felt their property taxes are too high. But instead of getting into a debate about the merits of shifting that burden, the provincial has decided to force those shifts the province because it's their policy," he said. Seiling said that two- thirds of the regional tax increase was also a result of provincial downloading, with the transfer of the land ambulance service to the municipality and the administration costs and labour costs that went along with thatshiit Region officials blame province for tax hike WWW”; L "tntheeseonh.ismgiory "It was provincially mandat- Strickland said the ed, and provincially legislat- provincial government has ed." failed to make its case for Some homeowners will these changes to the public, be: Mullah hard hit by and decided instead to bring thelshiftfwith their takes them in through the back being raised as high as 15, 'door, adding the province pet cent thisyar with all the; Fi has to take some of the heat increases and changes hr V for this fundamental shift in assessment factored in. And tax policy. there could be much more "If the provincial govern- equalization between the ment believes that by intro- "We had no say in it whatsoever," said Strickland. "It was provincially mandat- ed, and ptovincially legislat- ed." And Waterloo Regional Coun. Sean Strickland argued whether it was fair to shift the tax burden to homeowners who have less flexibility to pay for property tax increases, particularly the growing segment of the population living on fixed incomes. there wasn't enough money to make it work, There weren't enough winners to pay the losers, so the tools the province gave us werent even workable." "If the provincial govern- ment believes that by intro- ducing these fairness ratios it's going to be more attrac- tive for business and ids going to create more jobs, that's ftne. But they need to say that, and present their rationale for making these changes," said Strickland. "That's the issue I have. 'lfthistrend continuesin changing the tax ratio, we could potentially see these types of increases for years to come as we see taxes shifted from the business classes to the residential property owners," said Strickland. "Ttaditionally businesses have had the ttexibility to pay their taxes, and in some cases can even be written off depending on certain accounting proce- dures. "They've had much more flexibility dealing with municipal tax rates than local homeowners do." tax classes to come.