Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, your Standing Committee on Government Operations is pleased to provide its Report on the Review of Bill 18, An Act to Amend the Cities, Towns and Villages Act, and commends it to the House.
Introduction
Bill 18, sponsored by the Department of Municipal and Community Affairs (MACA), amends the Cities, Towns and Villages (CTV) Act to provide municipal councils governed under the act with new powers: the authority to impose a tax on tourist accommodations; and the authority to allow property owners to finance energy efficiency or renewable energy works through local improvement charges added to the property owner's municipal tax bill. It is important to note that these new powers are separate from one another and not related, except that they are both dealt with under the Cities, Towns and Villages Act, the legislation that sets out the powers of tax-based municipal governments.
Bill 18 received second reading in the Legislative Assembly on May 29, 2018, and was referred to the Standing Committee on Government Operations ("the committee") for review.
The standing committee is pleased to report on its review of Bill 18: An Act to Amend the Cities, Towns and Villages Act.
Background
The Cities, Towns and Villages Act governs the tax-based municipalities of Yellowknife, Norman Wells, Fort Smith, Inuvik, Hay River, and Fort Simpson in the Northwest Territories. The amendments proposed to the CTV Act under Bill 18 would provide these municipalities with two new areas of authority that municipalities could choose to exercise at their discretion.
Tourist Accommodation Tax
As drafted, Bill 18 provides tax-based municipalities with the authority to pass a bylaw imposing a tourist accommodation tax, not exceeding 4 percent of the daily accommodation rate on anyone who offers accommodation in return for money within the municipal boundaries.
The bill prohibits the tax from being imposed on the following persons and classes of accommodation: accommodation paid for more than 30 continuous days; accommodation where the rate is less than $20 per night; accommodation where the subject of the tax is the Government of the Northwest Territories or its public boards and agencies; any person or family member being accommodated as a result of medical travel; anyone paying for a stay at a hospital or healthcare facility; or any other class of persons or bodies set out in the regulations. Collectively, these exemptions are referred to as "exclusions" in the act's marginal notes.
The bill also sets out other matters a municipality may include it its bylaw. This includes further exemptions and rebates from the tax; penalties for failure to comply; interest on outstanding payments; audit and inspection powers; dispute resolution mechanisms; enforcement; and any other matters council considers important. It also provides that municipalities may go to court to attempt to recover unpaid amounts.
The bill authorizes municipal councils to enter into revenue-sharing agreements with not-for-profit organizations for promoting tourism, and with persons and bodies for the collection and administration of tourist accommodation taxes. It also requires that tax revenue be used only for supporting tourism initiatives, such as the provision of visitor services and the promotion of the community and the NWT as a tourism destination.
Finally, Bill 18 proposes to enhance the Minister's regulation-making authority:
- Governing the collection of a tourist accommodation tax;
- Prescribing conditions and limits on that tax;
- Prescribing persons and classes of accommodations that are exempt from the tax;
- Respecting agreements between the municipality and hotel operators regarding the collection of taxes; and
- Respecting the sharing of revenue with not-for-profit organizations.
Energy Upgrades and Retrofits through Local Improvement Bylaws
Currently, the CTV Act allows municipalities to make upgrades or improvements to groups of properties adjacent to one another, and to charge the owners of these properties for the cost of the work on their property tax bills.
These types of upgrades, referred to as "local improvements," tend to be new or replacement construction projects intended to upgrade or improve certain conditions within residential, commercial, and industrial areas of the municipality. Examples include street paving, driveway crossings, sidewalk replacement, lane paving, curb and gutter replacement, boulevards and street lighting, and extending sanitary, storm or water systems. Subject to local bylaws, the participation of property owners in these types of standard local improvements may be mandatory.
Bill 18 proposes to give tax-based municipalities the authority, by bylaw, to enable individual owners of private property to improve the energy efficiency of their homes or businesses and use the "local improvement charge" mechanism to pay off the cost of the energy installation over time.
This would allow interested private property owners to undertake energy efficiency or renewable energy retrofits or improvements without having to pay the costs upfront. Instead, they could have the municipality add the costs to their property tax bill to be paid off over time.
The most important difference between the standard type of local improvements tax-based municipalities already have the authority to undertake, and this new type of local improvement, is that the latter is completely voluntary on the part of a private property owner. A municipality must have the written consent of the property owner in order to authorize a levy against their property tax bill.
Bill 18 sets out the administrative process for how this new type of local improvement can be put into effect, including rules for how the energy efficiency or renewable energy work must be described, how costs must be determined, the requirement for the passing of bylaws to charge a levy against a private property, and for determining the period over which the costs will be repaid.
In addition, Bill 18 includes provisions:
- Specifying that costs may include reasonable engineering expenses and administrative costs, and interests on borrowing;
- Requiring that a municipality give public notice of its intent to pass a bylaw and sets out the required contents of that notice;
- Requiring that a municipality pass a second bylaw once energy retrofit is completed, to levy a local improvement charge against a property;
- Requiring full cost recovery for each project financed through a local improvement charge;
- Allowing the municipality to streamline the administrative process for passing these bylaws by allowing the bylaw to authorize a specific or series of energy efficiency or renewable energy works or any works that satisfy the requirements of a program of the municipality; and
- Require reporting by municipalities to the Minister.
Mr. Speaker, I will now ask the honourable Member for Hay River North to continue reading of the Report. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.