Members of Canmore’s downtown business association approved a major budget increase for the organization next year that will see it hire a part-time executive director.
Business Revitalization Zone (BRZ) members met last Wednesday (Sept. 21) to discuss an 88 per cent budget increase, along with changes to the municipal bylaw that establishes the group and authorizes it to collect taxes from landowners and businesses in the downtown area.
The majority voted for the budget to increase from $69,050 this year to $130,420 next year and spend $35,000 to hire an executive director on top of $15,000 for an administrator.
Outgoing chair Hugh Tafel explained with a volunteer board it is hard and time consuming to represent BRZ members interests to council and organizing major events and marketing campaigns.
For other organizations in town like Tourism Canmore Kananaskis and the Destination Marketing Fund, Tafel said, these duties would fall to a paid employee.
Members also approved changes to the bylaw regarding membership, terms on the board and assessment rolls.
Currently, BRZ fees, or taxes, are charged to landowners, but because the BRZ is supposed to work for businesses the expectation is the tax is passed onto individual tenants.
It is proposed in the bylaw that a membership roll and assessment roll be established separately. Membership would apply to both businesses and landowners while assessment would only be for property owners.
By structuring the group in such a way, the BRZ can collect taxes for vacant properties.
The bylaw also changed how properties are assessed to combine square footage and location (main street frontage, other frontage and rear, lower and upper levels) to determine how much each unit is taxed.
Changes included staggering board appointments so the board does not have to be completely replaced every two years.
It also creates two assessment roles – one for landowners and one for members and sets out the board may exempt non-profit businesses from a levy.
Not everyone present was in support of the changes.
Long-time BRZ critic Lawrence Hutchings challenged the changes as making the bylaw illegal.
Hutchings has taken his challenge of the BRZ’s structure to court before and lost.
Tafel said the municipality has taken the changes to the bylaw through a legal review and assured members it is legal and defendable.
Both budget and bylaw changes must now go to council for final approval.
A new board for the group was also elected by members at the meeting. The new board is Dave Carlson (Unlimited), Kayla Kernick (Just Be), Sean Meggs (Tin Box), Charlene Cherniwchan (Mut Hut), Lee Novak (Boulder) and Mike Gordon (Stonewaters).
