Property tax
The province sets the assessments. Council sets the service levels, and the tax rate is just the conclusion. We have to have honest conversations about what services we want and what they cost, not about a percentage.
Where I stand
Most candidates make the property tax rate the headline of their campaign. The rate is downstream of two decisions:
- Council decides what services the city delivers, and at what level. That sets the budget.
- The province, through Service NB, sets the assessed value of every property. That sets the base.
- The rate is whatever number closes the gap between the two.
A council that promises lower rates without lower services is promising what it cannot deliver. A council that promises higher services without higher rates is doing the same. The job is to be honest about the trade-off.
What I would push for is the actual conversation: here are the services the city provides, here is what each costs, here is where we are over- or under-spending compared to other NB cities our size. From that, residents can decide what they want to fund. The rate follows.
A note on what is not fair in the current structure: residential taxpayers in Saint John carry an outsized share of the city budget because some of the largest industrial and federal landowners contribute less than their assessed value would suggest. The Irving paper mill pays roughly $670,000 a year on 800,000 square metres of central peninsula land, less than half what it paid in 2012. The Port of Saint John is on federal land and pays Payments in Lieu of Taxes that have long been disputed. These are conversations the city should keep having with the province and the federal government.
What I will push for on council
- A public service-levels conversation: what the city delivers, what each line costs, how Saint John compares to peer NB cities.
- Continued advocacy on industrial and federal-land assessment shortfalls.
- No promise to raise, lower, or freeze the rate without the service-level decision behind it.