Property Management A Regional report focusing on the GTA, Hamilton & Niagara March 2012
Vol.19 No 1
Report
Cost-cutting Considerations
Performance-based Conservation
Thrust for Thrift Restraint Could Propel Property Tax Reform By Barbara Carss
A proposed measure to capture lost
Fiscal Factors Underpin Density
Contents Drummond Commission Recommendations 1 Conservation Opportunities in the Public Sector 9 Development Charges and Growth Management 11
tax revenue in Ontario could deliver lower property taxes for commercial/industrial ratepayers in the cities of Toronto and Hamilton, albeit with counterbalancing increases for some of their contemporaries in other municipalities. One of the nearly 350 recommendations in the recently released report of the Commission on the Reform of Ontario’s Public Services – commonly know n as the Drummond repor t in reference to the Commission’s Chair, Don Drummond – reiterates longstanding calls from the Toronto Office Coalition and the Hamilton Chamber of Commerce for a single, uniform business education tax (BET) rate throughout the province.
“A level tax playing field across the Greater Toronto Area would certainly help reduce the regional disparity experienced in the Office Property class,” observes Jeff Orlans, the Chairman of the Toronto Office Coalition, which represents owners, managers and tenants of approximately 55 million square feet of commercial office space, primarily located in downtown Toronto. From the Drummond Commission’s perspective, such a move would eliminate an illogical revenue model that ties the education portion of the property tax bill to a patchwork of historical tax rates in Ontario’s municipalities that date back to 1998. A seven-year phased tax reduction program, now in its 5th year, to lower the Continued on page 4.