velvetpage (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
velvetpage) wrote2008-04-23 08:33 pm
velvetpage) wrote2008-04-23 08:33 pm
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To my neighbours in Flamborough (letter to the editor)
Background: Some years ago, under the aegis of a government that doesn't deserve to be remembered by name, Hamilton underwent a forced amalgamation with several surrounding suburban municipalities. Since then, the suburbs have seen their taxes go up, for several reasons. First is that the suburbs could afford lower taxes when they were separate - they didn't have social services to pay and their infrastructure was mostly much newer, so upkeep was less. Second was that housing prices were lower across the board, and property taxes are linked to a home's value (even if people didn't touch the value of their home.) Third, in Flamborough at least, there was a subsidy coming in from Flamborough Downs, a racetrack with slot machines.
Well, when the city underwent amalgamation, taxes went up due to rising property values and some evening-out of the tax system. Mind you, we in the old city also underwent tax increases which have exceeded inflation every single year, and the city is still broke. But Flamborough residents kept the subsidy they were getting for Flamborough Downs - the money was not pooled into the city coffers to affect everyone's taxes.
Until now. City Council has voted to end the subsidy and pool that money. That means a 9% increase in property taxes for Flamborough - and a 3.1% increase for the lower city where I live.
My home is valued at 55% of the average price of a Flamborough home. Yet my property taxes are 66% of what they pay. Meanwhile, living as I do in an older part of the city, my sewers and roads are in a sad state of repair and my home needs more maintenance due to its age (almost ninety years) than the average home in Flamborough, especially Waterdown, where the houses are mostly brand-new developments.
To my neighbours in Flamborough: you're casting the blame in the wrong direction. Cast it instead on a property tax system that attaches property taxes to values that don't benefit the homeowner unless they either sell or borrow against their homes, and on the influx of buyers and developers that have raised property values through the roof in your community.
Everyone's hurting. Everyone's paying too much for too little. Get used to it, or write a letter to your MPP and MP - not about deamalgamation, but about real help for municipalities in trouble.
Well, when the city underwent amalgamation, taxes went up due to rising property values and some evening-out of the tax system. Mind you, we in the old city also underwent tax increases which have exceeded inflation every single year, and the city is still broke. But Flamborough residents kept the subsidy they were getting for Flamborough Downs - the money was not pooled into the city coffers to affect everyone's taxes.
Until now. City Council has voted to end the subsidy and pool that money. That means a 9% increase in property taxes for Flamborough - and a 3.1% increase for the lower city where I live.
My home is valued at 55% of the average price of a Flamborough home. Yet my property taxes are 66% of what they pay. Meanwhile, living as I do in an older part of the city, my sewers and roads are in a sad state of repair and my home needs more maintenance due to its age (almost ninety years) than the average home in Flamborough, especially Waterdown, where the houses are mostly brand-new developments.
To my neighbours in Flamborough: you're casting the blame in the wrong direction. Cast it instead on a property tax system that attaches property taxes to values that don't benefit the homeowner unless they either sell or borrow against their homes, and on the influx of buyers and developers that have raised property values through the roof in your community.
Everyone's hurting. Everyone's paying too much for too little. Get used to it, or write a letter to your MPP and MP - not about deamalgamation, but about real help for municipalities in trouble.
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