BANFF – The COVID-19 pandemic has led to a 15 per cent drop in commercial property assessments in the tourist town.
Residential assessments, on the other hand, are down less than one per cent.
Overall, the taxable assessments of residential, institutional and commercial properties in Banff dropped $208,553,000 from $3.239 billion to $3.031 billion, for an average overall decrease of 6.9 per cent.
Non-residential assessments, including hotels and downtown retail properties, have decreased from $1.338 billion to $1.138 billion – a reduction of $200 million or 15 per cent. The total loss in value to all hotels specifically was $176 million.
Chris Hughes, the director of corporate services for the Town of Banff, said an income-based approach is used to determine the market value of commercial properties, which is based on the year end of June 30, 2020.
“At that point, we would not have seen the full impact of the COVID pandemic,” he said during a recent budget meeting, noting hotel assessments are also based on a three-year average. “So those drops don’t count for the full impact of the pandemic.”
On the residential side, property assessments are based on actual sales.
Residential assessments have decreased about $8.25 million, or less than one per cent, from $1.902 billion to $1.893 billion.
“They’ve held fairly steady,” Hughes said.
While these assessment values will be used to determine the amount of tax to be charged to each property owner, Hughes said it’s important to remember a 15 per cent reduction in assessed value of non-residential assessment doesn’t necessarily equate to a 15 per cent reduction in taxes.
“It will be the operating budget, in large part, that will determine the average change in taxes,” he said.
“And this year, because 2020 was such an anomaly, we’ve been using 2019 as a base year when we speak about the change in taxation.” Banff council has reduced municipal property taxes by 5.6 per cent for 2021.
The 2020 property assessments will be mailed out this month. The deadline to appeal assessments will be 60 days from the mail date of the notices.
Once the appeal deadline has passed, administration will bring back options for council to consider when setting the 2021 tax rate bylaw, likely to be done in May.
In addition, the Town collects taxes on behalf of the Alberta government for the education requisition. The municipality has no control over that.
“We have very little insight as to what that will be at this point; they haven’t released an education budget,” Hughes said.
“It would be a fool’s game to try to estimate what that will be this year.”
