WHEREAS the claim by some major industrial class taxpayers of a problem of competitiveness with municipal property taxes is unproven as municipal property tax forms a very small portion of the cost of production for major industries, and there is no evidence that shifting property taxes away from the owners of major industry onto owners of other property classes will improve industrial success; AND WHEREAS the UBCM Committee examining the industrial taxation complaint has as yet not had the benefit of any analyses which demonstrates that the current system of apportioning property taxes among assessment classes by municipal councils has caused destructive taxation on industrial properties: THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that UBCM strongly endorse the current authority of municipal governments to set the relative municipal property tax burden among the assessment classes within their respective communities, and opposes initiatives to remove this important feature of municipal governance in British Columbia; AND BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the UBCM fund a rigorous independent analysis to determine the statistical causality between municipal property taxation and industrial activity.
