Did you know that over 40% of a typical tax bill is outside the City's control?
Many of the charges on your property tax bill represent fees from the Province and other regional bodies. These charges include provincial school tax, TransLink, BC Assessment, regional government, and the Municipal Finance Authority. In addition, 61% of your sewer fees and 68% of your water fees are determined by Metro Vancouver. We include all these charges on your tax bill, but the City does not set them.
Business property tax bill
Approximately 48% of the fees on your tax bill are outside of the City's budget control.
Single-family detached home property tax bill
Approximately 41% of the fees on your tax bill are outside of the City's budget control.
$16 million has been spent on civic building upgrades since 2004. The retrofits equate to a minimum annual savings of $920,000 and a 300,000 tonne reduction in greenhouse gases.
If the value of my property increases, does the City get extra revenue?
City Council first determines the overall operating budget the city needs. Then, non-tax revenues, such as the estimated income from business licences, parking revenue and movie production fees are subtracted. This helps determine the overall tax levy to be collected and the property tax increase needed.
Changes in property value won't change the overall tax levy. In other words, the City won't get extra revenues simply because your property values goes up. Instead, tax rates are adjusted to generate the amount of revenue needed to run the City's operations.
Why does my property tax go up more than the property tax increase approved by Council?
Every year, Council approves the overall tax levy as part of the operating budget process. Individual properties could experience a different tax increase, depending on how that property's assessed value has changed—relative to the average in its class. If your property increases more than the class average, your tax increase could be higher than the overall increase, or vice versa.
Tax redistribution
The City is taking steps to balance property taxes between business and homes in order to find an equitable balance while remaining competitive with other municipalities. Through that strategic approach, City Council redistributed a total of $52 million from non-residential properties to residential properties between 1994 and 2011.