‘It’s gonna make things tougher:’ Edmontonians react to nearly 20% property tax plan over 4 years

Edmontonians are staring down a nearly 20 per cent increase to their property taxes over four years if city council greenlights a new budget plan.

Managers working at the City of Edmonton came out with a budget plan with four years of property tax increases between four to five per cent.

READ: Four years of 4-5% tax increases pitched in Edmonton draft budget

It comes with some changes like better snow clearing, wider and smoother roads, smoother alleys.

But what do Edmontonians think about it?

“It seems quite drastic to me,” one person said.

“It’s a lot of added costs where your wages aren’t keeping up with the increase,” said a third.

“Everything’s increasing, including groceries and gas, that this is just gonna add another thing that we can’t do anything about, and it’s not gonna help anybody,” added another.

Mayor Andrew Knack says he doesn’t want to see another four years of big increases, like in the last term, with so many struggling with affordability.

“For me, it was about if I’m gonna ask for more, it needs to be in a moderate amount, and I think $20 a month more is a moderate amount, and it needs to make sure it’s providing real service improvements for Edmontonians,” the mayor said.

City Manager Eddie Robar billed the budget as a back-to-basics plan, mainly staying the course, but with some added spending for grass cutting, graffiti removal, more fire stations, another $100 million to widen roads, almost half a billion to fix multiple bridges, including $44 million for the High Level Bridge.

Included is more money for snow clearing, which could see neighbourhood streets ploughed regularly instead of once a season.

“All you mentioned are essential for the city to function,” an Edmontonian told CityNews.

“I don’t have a problem with giving more money to the police, to be honest with you,” said another. I mean, we’re downtown Edmonton, and you can see an additional police presence down here is good.”

The Edmonton Chamber of Commerce said it was glad to see some focus on economic development.

“We’re not saying no taxes. We’re just saying if we are gonna have taxes and residents are gonna pay for services, we want those services for the businesses and the people living here to be really consistent,” said vice-president Heather Thomson.

Homeowners with the average property value of about $492,000 would pay about $335 a month in property taxes. Broken down, that’s about $18 more per month than last year if the plan goes ahead.

“I mean, if you look at it that way, $18 doesn’t seem too bad, but compounding that onto three to five years, it’s not gonna make things easier for Edmontonians. It’s gonna make things tougher.”

City council will debate the budget in three weeks.

–With files from Lauren Boothby