Owen Sound Committee - Corporate Services Meeting Transcript — September 11, 2025

00:00:17 Speaker 01: It is five thirty p.m., and I will call the Corporate Services Committee meeting of September the eleventh to order.

00:00:25 Speaker 01: This evening at number two, call for additional business.

00:00:30 Speaker 01: Does anyone have any additional business this evening?

00:00:33 Speaker 01: Seeing none.

00:00:35 Speaker 01: I will also note that we have member Neil McEachin virtually this evening, and we are missing three members, but we do have quorum.

00:00:47 Speaker 01: At number three, declaration of interest.

00:00:49 Speaker 01: Does anyone have anything to declare this evening?

00:00:51 Speaker 01: Seeing none.

00:00:52 Speaker 01: Number four, confirmation of minutes.

00:00:54 Speaker 01: The minutes of the Corporate Services Committee that was held on July 10, that was held on July tenth, two thousand and twenty-five.

00:01:01 Speaker 01: Does anyone want to move those minutes?

00:01:03 Speaker 01: That was here at the meeting.

00:01:05 Speaker 01: I think I was here.

00:01:09 Speaker 01: I will move the minutes.

00:01:13 Speaker 01: Okay, so Brock has moved the minutes.

00:01:16 Speaker 01: I will call the question.

00:01:17 Speaker 01: All in favour?

00:01:18 Speaker 01: I have an issue.

00:01:19 Speaker 01: Oh, yep.

00:01:20 Speaker 01: Go ahead.

00:01:21 Speaker 01: Yeah, I just—I did declare I had a conflict of interest regarding my employment by the On Sound Attack, which claimed by the Unsound Attack, which is a tenant of the Bayshore facility,

00:01:29 Speaker 01: which I think was part of Brady's report that evening, and it's not included in the minutes.

00:01:34 Speaker 01: Maybe it didn't need to be, but okay.

00:01:37 Speaker 01: Thank you.

00:01:39 Speaker 01: Again, I'll call the question because I missed who put their hand up there.

00:01:43 Speaker 01: All in favour?

00:01:44 Speaker 01: And that carries.

00:01:45 Speaker 01: Thank you.

00:01:47 Speaker 01: Um.

00:01:49 Speaker 01: So at number five, deputations and presentations, we have none this evening.

00:01:53 Speaker 01: Number six, public forum, we have no one in the chamber this evening.

00:01:57 Speaker 01: Number seven, correspondence received for which direction is required.

00:02:00 Speaker 01: We have none, which brings us to number eight, reports of city staff.

00:02:04 Speaker 01: And at eight a one this evening, we have a report from the Fire Chief regarding a fire mark update.

00:02:13 Speaker 01: I believe so.

00:02:13 Speaker 01: We'll turn it over to Chief Eagleson.

00:02:15 Speaker 01: Thank you, Chairman.

00:02:23 Speaker 02: The report before you tonight is really just a check-in and an update.

00:02:29 Speaker 02: The City started a third-party service to recover costs after structure fires had occurred in two thousand and twenty-one, and we didn't really have any consistent data, and the year-to-year was up and down,

00:02:46 Speaker 02: extremely value-wise based on how many fires we had that year.

00:02:51 Speaker 02: That year, they have been very successful in collecting revenue we wouldn't otherwise collect, and this report is just checking in and saying we're happy with their services.

00:03:04 Speaker 02: We have really done some homework and looked for any other services that might be offering this same type of technology.

00:03:12 Speaker 02: And in a nutshell, it's the insurance professionals that know the insurance industry well enough to go in and make these claims for us on any given file.

00:03:25 Speaker 02: We get an email back with every fax and email and phone call and all they've done to recover on that file.

00:03:35 Speaker 02: And sometimes there's thirty or forty transactions before they can recover.

00:03:40 Speaker 02: The insurance industry is intricate, and it's—they don't just love giving away money, and you have to ask over and over in different ways for the money you're deserving.

00:03:48 Speaker 02: For the money you're deserved, and by "deserved" I said I mean this is non-peril side of the insurance policies that the insurance companies have been collecting for years and years on residential and commercial policies,

00:04:02 Speaker 02: and rarely giving back to the communities that provide the service.

00:04:06 Speaker 02: We take care, or we take very close track of our expenses during the fires, stuff we use, stuff that's broken, that kind of thing,

00:04:16 Speaker 02: and this Firemark company receives that from us for on our behalf from the insurance company.

00:04:25 Speaker 02: I feel very much that we could never have the knowledge to keep up and collect it ourselves.

00:04:33 Speaker 02: They're insurance experts that know the game, and we just—we don't.

00:04:39 Speaker 02: Our involvement is simply supply them with our standard incident report and all the information about the call, and then they do the rest and send us a check.

00:04:50 Speaker 02: I was holding off on actually publishing this agenda because we have one big fire in two thousand and twenty-five out of commercial residents on the edge of town,

00:05:00 Speaker 02: and it would have made our numbers look a lot better.

00:05:03 Speaker 02: But we're still waiting to see what we'll see from that.

00:05:07 Speaker 02: All said and done, it's the revenue is not huge amounts.

00:05:11 Speaker 02: It's ten thousand a year, maybe twelve thousand.

00:05:16 Speaker 02: If we get the next check from them, but that's not a bad thing.

00:05:22 Speaker 02: That means our fires are very, very low in the City.

00:05:28 Speaker 02: Happy to answer any questions.

00:05:32 Speaker 02: Brock, go ahead.

00:05:34 Speaker 03: Just on the thirty percent service charge.

00:05:37 Speaker 03: So, is that in the amounts that you have listed here?

00:05:43 Speaker 03: Is it 30% of those, or is that what we get net?

00:05:50 Speaker 02: The checks—the insurance funds—are received by Firemark.

00:05:53 Speaker 02: They take their 30% and then issue us the net.

00:05:57 Speaker 02: So this is net recovery after their fees.

00:06:04 Speaker 02: Does anyone else have any questions?

00:06:08 Speaker 01: Just for interest's sake, there's some that we're successful on, and some that we're not successful on.

00:06:12 Speaker 01: So, what is the difference?

00:06:14 Speaker 01: Like, I've never heard of this before.

00:06:16 Speaker 01: So, clearly, in insurance policies, there's some sort of cost recovery thing in the policy that says that fire departments can claim for this.

00:06:28 Speaker 01: Can you just give us a little more background?

00:06:32 Speaker 02: Yeah, thank you for the question.

00:06:33 Speaker 02: I really should have mentioned that.

00:06:37 Speaker 02: It wasn't so—the unsuccessful ones really aren't a failure of Firemark.

00:06:42 Speaker 02: It's those are fires that we've had that either didn't have insurance, so there was no one to collect from, or they had insurance but they didn't have fire department costs written into their policy.

00:06:53 Speaker 02: So if you open your residential policy tonight, it will probably seventy-five percent of the time have fire department costs listed in that non-peril side, and you hardly ever recognize it, but it's there,

00:07:07 Speaker 02: and the insurance company collects for it.

00:07:09 Speaker 02: Well, they will only pay out if they are collecting for it.

00:07:13 Speaker 02: So to answer your question directly, it's when there isn't insurance or isn't adequate insurance for fire department costs.

00:07:20 Speaker 02: And we feel this is by far the fairest way.

00:07:26 Speaker 02: If we weren't—if we're billing to the homeowner and they didn't have that, well, that would be directly a cost to them after they've had a very devastating structure fire.

00:07:36 Speaker 02: So this way, if they don't have it, it doesn't cost them anything.

00:07:44 Speaker 01: Okay, thank you for that update.

00:07:46 Speaker 01: Does anyone want to move the recommendation in the report, which I believe was to receive for information?

00:07:54 Speaker 01: Right, Deputy Mayor Greig has moved that.

00:07:56 Speaker 01: So I will call the question.

00:07:57 Speaker 01: All in favour?

00:07:59 Speaker 01: And that carries unanimously.

00:08:02 Speaker 01: So at eight B one this evening, we have a report from the Purchasing and Claims Coordinator.

00:08:11 Speaker 01: Sorry, I was looking at the wrong one there.

00:08:14 Speaker 01: On the annual biannual summary of awarded purchases between fifty thousand and two hundred and forty-nine thousand from January first to June thirtieth, twenty twenty-five.

00:08:23 Speaker 01: So we welcome Lauren.

00:08:26 Speaker 04: Perfect.

00:08:26 Speaker 04: You don't see my name too often.

00:08:27 Speaker 04: So, good evening, committee, and thank you through you, Madam Chair.

00:08:32 Speaker 04: I'm certain everyone's quite familiar with these reports, so I'll keep it brief.

00:08:36 Speaker 04: So, both standard and non-standard purchases between fifty thousand and two hundred and fifty thousand dollars are approved by delegation of authority from council to the director of corporate services.

00:08:47 Speaker 04: This delegation enables an efficient and timely award process, while also reducing overall project timelines.

00:08:53 Speaker 04: An overview of the purchases between January and June two thousand and twenty-five is included in the attachment and are as followed.

00:09:01 Speaker 04: An emergency purchase for the cleaning, inspection, and installation of a new chlorine line at the water treatment plant at an award value of one hundred sixty-seven thousand three hundred ninety-five dollars.

00:09:13 Speaker 04: Due to the nature of this work, the total costs were uncertain until the project's completion.

00:09:19 Speaker 04: Council information report is scheduled to be presented by the manager of corporate services on September twenty-second,

00:09:25 Speaker 04: and then additionally a non-standard procurement purchase for laptop replacement at an award value of seventy-six thousand seven hundred and fifty dollars, and the recommendation with the report is that, in consideration of staff report CR-25-121,

00:09:42 Speaker 04: respecting the biannual summary of awarded purchases between fifty thousand and two hundred fifty thousand from January 1st, 2025, to June 30th, 2025,

00:09:52 Speaker 04: the Corporate Services Committee recommends that City Council receives the report for information purposes, and I'm happy to answer any questions.

00:10:02 Speaker 04: Great.

00:10:02 Speaker 04: Does anyone have any questions?

00:10:05 Speaker 01: No. I have one under the budget column.

00:10:11 Speaker 01: It just says like two hundred thousand dollars under twenty-five N dot two.

00:10:15 Speaker 01: Is that relating to the, like, was there a capital sheet in the the budget or something?

00:10:20 Speaker 01: So it was already in the budget.

00:10:22 Speaker 01: We just had to do it under an emergency type thing.

00:10:24 Speaker 01: Okay.

00:10:25 Speaker 01: Thank you.

00:10:26 Speaker 01: So if there's no other questions, is someone going to move?

00:10:30 Speaker 01: Oh, Kelly will move this.

00:10:32 Speaker 01: So I will call the question.

00:10:34 Speaker 01: All in favour?

00:10:36 Speaker 01: And that carries unanimously.

00:10:38 Speaker 01: Thank you, Lauren.

00:10:40 Speaker 01: And at eight C one, we have a report from the tax collector regarding MPA's revised rule for Section 357 applications, cancellation, reduction, or refund of property taxes.

00:10:54 Speaker 01: So we have Christine here tonight.

00:10:56 Speaker 01: Thank you.

00:11:01 Speaker 05: What a fun title!

00:11:02 Speaker 05: So, I'm presenting actually on behalf of Crystal Moffat, our tax collector.

00:11:06 Speaker 05: So, through the Madam Chair, this report deals with Section 357 of the Municipal Act, which allows property owners to apply for a cancellation, reduction,

00:11:14 Speaker 05: or refund in their property taxes when something unusual happens in the year.

00:11:19 Speaker 05: So, it's not captured in the returned roll.

00:11:21 Speaker 05: It's something that happens in the year itself, such as a building fire, major renovations, or for some reason a property becomes unusable for a part of the year.

00:11:31 Speaker 05: So, in the past, if a property was damaged or had major renovations, the Municipal Property Assessment Corporation or MPA would issue a revised assessment.

00:11:39 Speaker 05: That revised assessment would lower the property's assessed value, which would then trigger a reduction in the amount of property taxes levied for that year.

00:11:46 Speaker 05: As of July two, two thousand and twenty-four, MPA will no longer, or sorry, no longer issue a revised assessment for two specific subsections, so those two subsections are three hundred and fifty-seven one D II,

00:12:01 Speaker 05: so two, which is substantially unusable buildings, for example after a fire, or subsection three hundred and fifty-seven one G, properties under active repair or renovations.

00:12:11 Speaker 05: So now, instead of issuing a revised assessment, MPA now issues what they call a notational value, which is essentially an estimate of the unusual portion of the property.

00:12:20 Speaker 05: So the main difference with this is that since MPA no longer issues a revised assessment for these sections,

00:12:26 Speaker 05: it's now up to the city to decide how much tax relief to grant using that notational value as a starting point.

00:12:33 Speaker 05: So that is the major difference that has happened.

00:12:36 Speaker 05: So this section, as I mentioned, is important because it recognizes changes can occur after the assessment roll is returned for the year.

00:12:43 Speaker 05: It gives municipalities the authority to make tax adjustments directly without requiring formal appeals to MPA.

00:12:48 Speaker 05: So this makes the process more accessible for ratepayers, and at the same time,

00:12:55 Speaker 05: the broad and complex nature of Section Three Hundred and Fifty Seven places a responsibility on the municipality to safeguard the application process as well as our assessment base.

00:13:04 Speaker 05: So, to do this effectively, the city needs a clear and consistent framework that spells out both the eligibility criteria and the amount of relief to be provided.

00:13:13 Speaker 05: So, Crystal and I and some of the other local tax collectors have had conversations about this for a long time.

00:13:20 Speaker 05: It's one of those things where people don't necessarily want to be first, but you don't want to be last as well,

00:13:26 Speaker 05: and you want to make sure you're somewhat in line with your neighbours and municipalities.

00:13:29 Speaker 05: So, from what we've recommended is that we want to develop policy after this.

00:13:34 Speaker 05: So, for substantially unusable buildings, staff recommend applying on a case-by-case basis.

00:13:39 Speaker 05: But instead of just having free range with that, we want to establish thresholds.

00:13:43 Speaker 05: So, what that means is that this balances fairness for property owners, considering that there may be a small fire that is only for one room,

00:13:52 Speaker 05: or it could be a whole motel that is ravaged by fire.

00:13:56 Speaker 05: So applying a standardized framework with those would be hard because it doesn't take into account the unique nature of each case.

00:14:04 Speaker 05: However, for repairs and renovations, we are recommending a standardized approach capped at 25% of the notational value, which is based on the affected days.

00:14:13 Speaker 05: So that's somewhat similar to the vacancy rebate calculations that we did before; this ensures fairness and predictability across applications.

00:14:22 Speaker 05: And then for all other subsections of Section 357, nothing would change.

00:14:27 Speaker 05: MPA continues to provide that reassessment, and the city will continue with the existing process.

00:14:33 Speaker 05: So within this report, there are two applications where we kind of expanded on what our recommended framework is that we're looking also for approval for tonight.

00:14:42 Speaker 05: The first one is Rockview Apartments.

00:14:45 Speaker 05: It was staff fully damaged by fire.

00:14:48 Speaker 05: Staff are recommending a seventy-five percent relief of the notational value, which equals a tax reduction of about eight thousand six hundred.

00:14:56 Speaker 05: And then the second one is Parkway Plaza, which is under active substantial renovations.

00:15:01 Speaker 05: Staff are recommending a standardized twenty-five percent relief, which equals a tax reduction of about five thousand dollars.

00:15:09 Speaker 05: This amount is manageable, and it's within the city's annual tax write-off budget that we account for each year.

00:15:16 Speaker 05: So the next steps with this is we do want to develop a formal Section 357 policy and procedure.

00:15:23 Speaker 05: We are looking to get committee approval of the two applications, and then also bring forward a bylaw to get delegated authority to the treasurer or designate to administer future applications.

00:15:36 Speaker 05: If not, each application would have to come to committee for approval.

00:15:39 Speaker 05: That is your committee's wish as well.

00:15:42 Speaker 05: So the full recommendations are in the report.

00:15:43 Speaker 05: They are somewhat lengthy, but I can read them out, or we can.

00:15:48 Speaker 05: Christina, do you want me to read them out, or just have them on the screen?

00:15:55 Speaker 05: On the screen.

00:15:56 Speaker 05: So yeah, they're just it's a long recommendation, but I'm happy to read them out if you'd like as well.

00:16:00 Speaker 05: We'll take any questions.

00:16:03 Speaker 05: Okay.

00:16:04 Speaker 05: Does anyone have any questions?

00:16:06 Speaker 05: We're going to go to Brock.

00:16:09 Speaker 03: Was there any rationale given why they made this change?

00:16:13 Speaker 03: Because it, like, they seem to have the ability to do it fairly easy, and municipalities really do not, based on this report.

00:16:25 Speaker 05: Correct.

00:16:26 Speaker 05: Their rationale was that it allows flexibilities for a municipality, and it's not them prescribing a revised assessment, which is then applied unanimously across the board.

00:16:37 Speaker 05: I would say have not seen one municipality yet that agrees with that because we don't have the expertise in-house to determine a notational value,

00:16:44 Speaker 05: and it was more standardized and easier to communicate when it was provided by MPA.

00:16:50 Speaker 05: But no, that's essentially their recommendation, and I know it's been discussed to try to get it to go back the other way, but has it happened yet?

00:17:02 Speaker 05: Anyone else?

00:17:03 Speaker 06: Neil, go ahead.

00:17:06 Speaker 06: I'm just curious how the relief threshold percent is arrived at.

00:17:10 Speaker 06: Maybe I missed you saying that, but I'm not sure I understand how that relief threshold percent is determined.

00:17:19 Speaker 05: Through you, Madam Chair, good question.

00:17:20 Speaker 05: So that is kind of what we want to formally establish.

00:17:25 Speaker 05: So when we first looked at the report, we were thinking we should bring these relief thresholds directly to you and have you communicate on them.

00:17:33 Speaker 05: The hard part with that is even though our tax consultants at this point do not have pinpointed an exact percentage that all like neighbouring Grey municipalities are going to do.

00:17:44 Speaker 05: So we're trying to find something that's you know in line with them.

00:17:49 Speaker 05: We kind of did look at some other places that have gone ahead with City of Toronto and some of the larger ones and borrowed some of their relief thresholds that they have used for some.

00:18:00 Speaker 05: For example, the one substantially damaged by fire, we've said something like seventy-five percent because, although it is substantially damaged by fire, there's still the land value in a portion that remains,

00:18:10 Speaker 05: and they still benefit from city services.

00:18:12 Speaker 05: So, it was our city staffer of the opinion that one hundred percent relief would not be fair in that circumstance.

00:18:18 Speaker 05: So, those are kind of some examples of how we got to where we are.

00:18:26 Speaker 05: Anyone else?

00:18:27 Speaker 05: Scott.

00:18:31 Speaker 07: Thanks, Christine.

00:18:31 Speaker 07: It's a small report, but I have a sense there's a lot of work behind the scenes here.

00:18:38 Speaker 07: I guess the first question I have is: in cases of some fire loss, people have insurance coverages for all sorts of different riders.

00:18:55 Speaker 07: You know, paying your employees depending on the fire outcome, loss of use.

00:19:00 Speaker 07: There's no way that we could create a tax deduction and then have an entity still be reimbursed from their insurance company for a full value or a loss protection.

00:19:14 Speaker 07: I don't want to call it double dipping, but it would kind of have a bit of a feel of a double dip.

00:19:20 Speaker 07: If you had insurance coverage and then to benefit secondarily off of a special programmememe that MPAC has walked away from and Empac has walked away from, and you know,

00:19:30 Speaker 07: Empac is still increasing how much it costs every year for the county to pay for their services.

00:19:38 Speaker 07: But we haven't had a reassessment since 2016, and even a renovation, they're writing it back to a 2016 value yet.

00:19:48 Speaker 07: So, yeah, I guess I share some of Councillor Hamley's frustrations, perhaps with what's going on and them walking away from some of their responsibility.

00:19:56 Speaker 07: But I just, I guess, my main concern when I read this was: Is there any potential for like a double-dipping situation to occur here?

00:20:05 Speaker 07: Or have you evaluated those types of considerations?

00:20:18 Speaker 02: I'm not really worried about a double-dipping situation.

00:20:22 Speaker 02: For them to get insurance reimbursement, they're going to have to pay their taxes and get a receipt from the tax office.

00:20:29 Speaker 02: The receipt would show the reduced amount they've actually paid, and that's what they would get back from the insurance company.

00:20:38 Speaker 02: Much like we just talked about: insurance companies don't generously throw money out without the right documentation, and I think we'd provide that through the tax office.

00:20:52 Speaker 05: Thank you, Chief.

00:20:53 Speaker 05: Through you, Madam Chair and Deputy Mayor Greig.

00:20:55 Speaker 05: So another thing with that that we can do to build into this is to develop more fulsome applications where we can require them to swear an affidavit or to show us some of their insurance

00:21:04 Speaker 05: claims or those types of things.

00:21:06 Speaker 05: We can build them into the applications.

00:21:07 Speaker 05: And what staff are recommending for any of those that would be eligible for the higher thresholds?

00:21:12 Speaker 05: It's a more lengthy application process, and can you try to capture some of those concerns that you're worried about, just to make sure that they're not essentially getting the benefit twice?

00:21:23 Speaker 07: Okay.

00:21:24 Speaker 07: That sounds good because I just certainly wouldn't want there to be a time delay.

00:21:28 Speaker 07: For instance: say here are the taxes I pay, then here is my reimbursement, and then the application from the City comes several months after the fact.

00:21:38 Speaker 07: Okay.

00:21:41 Speaker 07: Okay.

00:21:42 Speaker 07: Any other questions?

00:21:43 Speaker 07: Nothing.

00:21:44 Speaker 01: So the recommendations of the report are that staff direct them to bring forward a policy and procedure for administering applications under Section 357 of the Municipal Act, 2001,

00:22:01 Speaker 01: including a case-by-case approach for applications made under Subsection 357.1(2).

00:22:06 Speaker 01: For substantially unusable buildings, where thresholds for tax relief will be established through the forthcoming policy and will guide the amount of tax relief provided, as well as a standardized approach under Subsection 35.

00:22:20 Speaker 01: Under subsection 357.1(g), repairs and renovations where property tax relief will be determined using a percentage reduction capped at 25%, based on the vacant portion's notional value deemed unusable square footage returned provided by MPA,

00:22:37 Speaker 01: and maintaining existing processes for all other subsections of Section 357.

00:22:43 Speaker 01: And then part two: approve the two current Section 357 applications as outlined in the report for Rockview Apartments and Parkway Plaza; and three,

00:22:53 Speaker 01: direct staff to bring forward a bylaw to amend the Delegation of Authority bylaw to delegate authority to the Treasurer or designee to administer and approve future applications consistent with the finalized Section 357 policy.

00:23:07 Speaker 01: Does someone want to move the recommendation?

00:23:10 Speaker 01: Yep.

00:23:10 Speaker 01: Go ahead.

00:23:16 Speaker 01: Thank you.

00:23:17 Speaker 01: It's been a little while.

00:23:19 Speaker 01: Through your Chair, we have two applications in front of us now.

00:23:23 Speaker 01: Do you have a sense of how many applications we might expect to see in a year for this?

00:23:27 Speaker 01: I know that's not always going to be the same number, but give or take approximately... it is hard to say.

00:23:36 Speaker 05: It could range approximately from five to 15.

00:23:39 Speaker 05: It really depends on if there's any unfortunate year for fires.

00:23:42 Speaker 05: If there are substantial renovations, we found as the economic situation tightens, less people have the cash flow for more substantial renovations, so we're not seeing as much under that section.

00:23:53 Speaker 05: So I would say there's not too many, but it is hard to say.

00:24:00 Speaker 05: Scott, if I guess item B, the part about 25% for the vacant... we used to have a vacant property tax rebate programmememe here,

00:24:12 Speaker 07: and I guess I just... if the public members don't want to speak on it, that's fine; just vote.

00:24:18 Speaker 07: But if you have any concerns or comments or apprehensions or anything,

00:24:23 Speaker 07: I'm very happy to listen to the public members on this one because there are certain buildings you don't have to go very far from here right now that are undergoing renovations and moving forward.

00:24:36 Speaker 07: I just would have an interest in the public appetite on whether they should or could qualify for such a reduction.

00:24:45 Speaker 07: So, if there were any concerns or comments, definitely I was myself very receptive to hearing them.

00:24:54 Speaker 08: Kelly, I think that it's meaningful that it can only be applied for in the year that the change is occurring, and my understanding is it can only be one year,

00:25:02 Speaker 08: so they can't reuse this programmememe.

00:25:04 Speaker 08: Whereas I would think...

00:25:05 Speaker 08: I'm not super familiar with the other tax rebate programmememe, but that would maybe be an ongoing vacancy programmememe.

00:25:11 Speaker 08: Is that accurate?

00:25:14 Speaker 08: So this again wouldn't allow them to double-dip because it would only... in that sense, I'm more comfortable with it.

00:25:19 Speaker 08: I certainly don't believe myself to be an expert in this area, but I think you know if there is truly an emergency, sort of...

00:25:27 Speaker 08: I guess I'm thinking more in terms of fire loss.

00:25:30 Speaker 08: That makes a lot of sense to me that we would want to provide some relief in those instances, with the other protections in place through insurance, which I thought was a really helpful clarification.

00:25:39 Speaker 08: The other section: there were various repairs and renovations.

00:25:44 Speaker 08: It makes sense to me that this would be more structured and would have a lower capped limit because presumably, if you have the money to do significant repairs,

00:25:52 Speaker 08: you have the money to pay your taxes more in full.

00:25:56 Speaker 08: So I think that's the one where I have a little more pause.

00:26:06 Speaker 05: Through you, Madam Chair, to Member Carmichael.

00:26:08 Speaker 05: So I can just kind of speak to that as well.

00:26:09 Speaker 05: So when we were looking at these, what we can also do is: if there was a renovation that did go over year-end, they could apply for it the next year.

00:26:18 Speaker 05: It is, however, prorated to the days in active renovation.

00:26:21 Speaker 05: So with that, some of our other municipal counterparts in larger demographics have also looked at the status of the building permit report.

00:26:29 Speaker 05: So those can be built into the application criteria as well to know it's an ongoing active renovation and not something that's just sitting, not actively being renovated.

00:26:37 Speaker 05: The 25% cap also acknowledges the fact that these renovations do typically add value in the long run; that impact would capture on their next reassessment.

00:26:47 Speaker 05: The other reason that some municipalities are looking for this 25% relief is it kind of discourages property owners from trying to do a formal request for consideration and get their assessment reduced on an ongoing

00:27:02 Speaker 05: basis that will affect their assessment going forward.

00:27:03 Speaker 05: This is more of a temporary adjustment rather than them trying to say that the assessment isn't lowered for a long period of time.

00:27:10 Speaker 05: So it's just also kind of a balance to try to counteract some of those concerns as well.

00:27:17 Speaker 08: But just if I'm understanding all of the history, which we've talked about before, the benefit that we would collect with the increase in value would be on the reassessment,

00:27:25 Speaker 08: which hasn't happened since 2016 and has no planned date to occur.

00:27:34 Speaker 05: Through the Madam Chair... so impact does still go out and add additional assessment.

00:27:38 Speaker 05: The confusing part of it is they don't add that assessment in today's dollars; they backdate those assessment dollars back to 2016 data.

00:27:47 Speaker 05: So say it added $40,000 in today's dollars as an assessment, and with this renovation, it could only add $20,000 to the assessment roll because it would backdate it to 2016 assessment dollars.

00:27:57 Speaker 05: So it does add assessment, but it's not the full assessment of what it should be if there was an active reassessment ongoing.

00:28:06 Speaker 05: Yep, go ahead, Dave.

00:28:17 Speaker 09: Have other municipalities come up with their thresholds yet, and have we done anything to kind of make sure that we're not completely out to lunch on where we're falling with our minimums and whatnot?

00:28:31 Speaker 05: Um...

00:28:31 Speaker 05: Through you, Madam Chair and Member Crane.

00:28:33 Speaker 05: So yes, when we did research on this, the 25% seems to be somewhat standardized based on what we found so far.

00:28:39 Speaker 05: There are a lot of people, and even Crystal and I were just at the Ontario conference,

00:28:44 Speaker 05: and it's still an ongoing discussion that people are trying to figure out how to administratively handle this change from MPAK.

00:28:51 Speaker 05: But that is in line with what we are seeing out there,

00:28:54 Speaker 05: and that we will also get guidance from our property tax consultant that works with us and the other members of Grey County to determine that it's in line as well.

00:29:06 Speaker 01: Okay, so just for clarification: the repairs and renovations has to have a minimum time of 90 days to qualify, but there's no stop point.

00:29:23 Speaker 05: Through you, Madam Chair.

00:29:24 Speaker 05: Yes, at this point, but that is also something that we could build into the application of the requirements, if that was the committee's intent.

00:29:32 Speaker 05: But at this point, yes, it's just they have to have a minimum of ninety days.

00:29:34 Speaker 05: But there's not like an end time frame if it's ongoing.

00:29:37 Speaker 05: But it would only be prorated for the number of days in that year.

00:29:41 Speaker 05: So, okay.

00:29:44 Speaker 01: So if it did go over the whole course of a year, then it would be twenty-five percent of the full amount of their taxes.

00:29:52 Speaker 01: Basically, is that right?

00:29:55 Speaker 01: Okay.

00:29:56 Speaker 01: Okay.

00:29:56 Speaker 01: Yeah.

00:29:57 Speaker 01: Okay.

00:29:59 Speaker 05: Yep.

00:29:59 Speaker 05: So it would be twenty-five percent of the notional value.

00:30:02 Speaker 05: So say they were only renovating fifty percent of the building, it would only be twenty-five percent of the fifty percent of the building.

00:30:09 Speaker 05: Yeah, for ninety days.

00:30:14 Speaker 05: Okay.

00:30:15 Speaker 05: I think we've got it.

00:30:17 Speaker 05: All right.

00:30:17 Speaker 05: Any other questions?

00:30:19 Speaker 01: And does anyone want to move the recommendation, or is there anything that anyone wants to change or alter, Kelly?

00:30:28 Speaker 08: I will move it, but I do just want to add one more comment, which is I note that you know, and it makes sense.

00:30:33 Speaker 08: I was thinking about it and referring back to the document that this is going to increase staff costs to be doing this work.

00:30:39 Speaker 08: That's kind of unknowable right now as well.

00:30:42 Speaker 08: How much time that will truly take?

00:30:44 Speaker 08: It's going to depend on the number of applications, etc. I just wonder if there's an opportunity to address Deputy Mayor Greig's points about the cost impact.

00:30:52 Speaker 08: The cost of MPA and the services reducing, and our workload increasing.

00:30:57 Speaker 08: If there's a way to capture that and communicate that somehow, or at least have a record of it, so that if there is an opportunity,

00:31:02 Speaker 08: we can make sure to have that ready to hand to kind of point to the fact that we're paying you more, but we're also having to pay for this as well.

00:31:09 Speaker 08: And you know, I don't know if it'll get us anywhere, but it's helpful to make sure we have that communicated, documented.

00:31:18 Speaker 01: Okay.

00:31:18 Speaker 01: So, Member Carmichael has moved the recommendation in the report.

00:31:22 Speaker 01: If there's nothing further, then I will call the question.

00:31:27 Speaker 01: All in favour?

00:31:29 Speaker 01: And that carries unanimously.

00:31:32 Speaker 01: Thank you, Christine.

00:31:38 Speaker 01: So that finishes our reports for this evening.

00:31:41 Speaker 01: At number nine, we have no matters postponed.

00:31:44 Speaker 01: At number ten, motions for which notice was previously given, we have none.

00:31:49 Speaker 01: At number eleven, correspondence provided for information.

00:31:52 Speaker 01: There is none.

00:31:53 Speaker 01: Number twelve, discussion of additional business.

00:31:55 Speaker 01: There is none.

00:31:56 Speaker 01: And at number thirteen, notices of motion.

00:31:58 Speaker 01: Does anyone have any notices?

00:32:00 Speaker 01: None.

00:32:01 Speaker 01: Okay.

00:32:02 Speaker 01: Then it is six twenty, and I will call the meeting adjourned.

00:32:05 Speaker 01: Thanks, everyone.