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WRAFT Ontario Pre-budget Presentation

Presentation by Al Morson on behalf of WRAFT and CAPTR at the Finance Minister's pre-budget hearings

January 18, 2007

WRAFT is part CAPTR. CAPTR is a coalition of 1 million residential property owners in Ontario that are seeking solutions to the currently unfair, volatile and unpredictable assessment system for property taxes.

Last summer the government froze property assessments for the next 3 years pending implementation of 22 recommendations by the Ontario Ombudsman. These dealt primarily with the issues of transparency and integrity. These recommendations do not cover the critical issues of predictability and fairness. The report said "It is not the function of the Ombudsman of Ontario to supplant the role of Parliamentarians, who decide the broad-based policy issues. Having said this, I cannot ignore the tidal wave of criticism that was directed at the legislative framework for property assessment in Ontario during this investigation"

The Ombudsman expanded on these concerns as including the volatility and unpredictability of assessments, the shift in tax burden to "hot" property markets that trapped seniors and people on fixed incomes and the resulting tax on substantial unrealized capital gains.

These are precisely the concerns of our Coalition - and after much research we are recommending a simple straight forward solution of a 5% annual cap. A 5% annual cap on assessment increases would address the predictability issue and lessen the unfairness and anxiety amongst home owners.

Such a solution or mitigating amendment needs to be adopted during this hiatus and well before the resumption of the current pure CVA assessment system.

This recommendation does not involve funding issues, as it is revenue neutral. Reform, such as this, can also lead to a reduction in the $160 million MPAC budget as well as the government costs of the Assessment Review Board. If the issue is not addressed in the budget it could become an important and unnecessary election priority.

Ontario has the highest property tax amongst all OECD countries and should therefore strive to be amongst the fairer regimes.

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