What happens when municipal taxes are written off?
Like many councils in the area, Centre Wellington too faces the issue of writing off taxes for a variety of reasons.
On Monday, council approved the write-off of taxes amounting to $44,213.
Sections 357 and 358 of the Municipal Act allow property owners to apply for the write-offs based on a number of reasons, including errors in property assessments, damage by fire or demolition, mobile home removal, overcharging and issues which prevented use of the property.
However, councillor Kirk McElwain questioned how this would affect the municipality.
“How do you handle taxes being lowered because of reassessment?” he asked.
Treasurer Wes Snarr said there are other avenues for tax reduction or decisions by the assessment review board and requests for reconsideration.
“This represents one of those tax write-offs,” Snarr said.
McElwain asked how this affects the calculations made in March/April, when reductions are made after that.
“How does that get figured into the bottom line?”
Snarr said, “We include a provision under the general administration section of the budget for tax write-offs.”
That is where the township portion is charged, he explained. The school board and county portions is recovered from those entities.
McElwain said if there are write-offs in 2011 based on reassessments, it affects the bottom line for revenues collected that year.
“Does that get carried over into the next year?” he asked.
Snarr responded, “It is a write-off in the year that it occurs, and the township portion is charged as an operating expense.”
McElwain said he posed the question because he expects to see more of these hearings because of wind farms coming on line.
“It could be a big number,” he said.
Council approved the report.
