THUNDER BAY -- After more than a year, leaders in the region say the Municipal Property Assessment Corporation is listening.
MPAC chair Dan Mathieson was in Thunder Bay Wednesday to meet with members of the Northwestern Ontario Municipal Association who have seen their cities and towns lose millions of dollars to reassessments.
Mathieson said it's one of the first times he knows of that MPAC has come to a community to consult but sees it happening more in the future. He said the meeting was productive and cordial, something mayor Keith Hobbs seconded despite his numerous criticisms of the board in the past.
"The board is really aligned with us and our thinking, they want to help us out," Hobbs said.
Mathieson said there are changes coming to MPAC over the next four years as it will show municipalities how assessments are done.
Some of those decisions haven't been communicated well in the past and the impacts, such as reassessing a mill in a town that relies almost exclusively on that mill for its industrial tax base, weren't fully understood. Mathieson wants to see MPAC and municipalities working together to get out in front of assessment issues.
The organization is also heading to the Ministry of Finance with NOMA to address a common issue, appeal decisions by the Assessment Review Board.
"We need to find a way though that we're not having those appeals and that the valuations that are put on at the start stick right to the end," Mathieson said.
MPAC also shares concerns with NOMA that the idea of functional obsolescence could find its way to residential taxes.
As technology changes and industry need less space to do business, it's been reassessed lower despite an operations' footprint, like a building that once housed obsolete equipment, remains the same and still needs municipal services.
Hobbs and Kenora mayor Dave Canfield have been arguing that someone with a large house whose children have grown up and moved away could start using the same idea to get their residential property tax down. Hobbs said that would be chaos for a city.
"They acknowledged it today as a board that's something that some smart tax lawyer could have a look at at and now we're looking at the residential tax base being eroded," Hobbs said.
