2018 Property Tax

[The Yen Man]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

Where money comes from is a foreign concept to government accountants and politicians. Their belief is that there is a printing press in the basement that can crank it out 24 hours a day and 7 days a week for their pleasure.

From my anecdotal observations, individual departments don't ever not spend any money in their budgets if they have surpluses for fear that if they save the money, come next year, they get their budgets reduced. So you have departments that spend needlessly so they can hit their annual budget amounts allocated to them.

The city has to just just take a harder stance and start cutting some of these, and tell departments tough, you're going to have to do more with less. That's how private sector companies work. Why would the city operate any differently?

[CaptainCrunch]

https://twitter.com/user/status/1137054577101066242


First of all, the increases that businesses have seen are huge so I don't see 10% as floating up skirts.


Second of all, this is just a PR relations move and an attempt to kick the concept of budget cuts down the road, while increasing the city's deficit.


Come out with an actual plan.

[chemgear]

https://calgaryherald.com/news/local...recycling-bins

City looks to expand program that snoops on residential recycling bins

[Weitz]

Originally Posted by chemgear

https://calgaryherald.com/news/local...recycling-bins

City looks to expand program that snoops on residential recycling bins

Into the black bin it will all go now!

[chemgear]

Originally Posted by Weitz

Into the black bin it will all go now!

Can you add all of City Council?

Can you imagine the debt and tax ####show if Nenshi got masturbatory Olympic farewell?

[ken0042]

From the article:
Sharon Howland, leader of program management for waste and recycling, said crews have been performing checks on about 5,000 blue and green bins annually for the past number of years

So based on 250 pick up days per year, that's 20 bins per day. Please tell me that a crew (not just one person) that checks bins- that cannot be their only job.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Locke

But not all of us we're making baller bank back then.

And I look at all the taxes in all the different places that I have to pay them and I think I'd vote for Negan. His Tax Regime was fairer.

More my point is we got used to a certain level of service for a certain price. That is no longer possible so we have to cut real services or increase taxation or both.

Simply finding efficiency isn’t enough.

[Weitz]

Originally Posted by ken0042

From the article:
Sharon Howland, leader of program management for waste and recycling, said crews have been performing checks on about 5,000 blue and green bins annually for the past number of years

So based on 250 pick up days per year, that's 20 bins per day. Please tell me that a crew (not just one person) that checks bins- that cannot be their only job.

Probably just the pick up crew checks X amount of bins a day on its run?

I know a friend of my got a note on his bin once for not having the right stuff in his blue bin.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by DiNaMo

Fair Comment. I guess just chalk it under the reasons why government is less efficient then private enterprise column.

Publicly traded private companies have lots of these inefficient procurement processes. Every major oil project in Alberta was three bids and a buy for any significant purchase or service.

There is some sole sourcing and shoping but also a lot of long drawn out bids

[Locke]

Originally Posted by GGG

More my point is we got used to a certain level of service for a certain price. That is no longer possible so we have to cut real services or increase taxation or both.

Simply finding efficiency isn’t enough.

Of course it isnt.

But we havent even tried it yet.

We hired a significant number of additional Government workers and raised taxes.

If I've said this once, I've said it a million times.

We are only looking at one side of the ledger.

You want taxes raised. Done and done. Every one we have has been raised and we've invented some new ones. But you can only do that to a certain extent.

[topfiverecords]

Originally Posted by chemgear

Can you add all of City Council?

Can you imagine the debt and tax ####show if Nenshi got masturbatory Olympic farewell?

Council could go in the green bin.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

https://twitter.com/user/status/1137054577101066242


First of all, the increases that businesses have seen are huge so I don't see 10% as floating up skirts.


Second of all, this is just a PR relations move and an attempt to kick the concept of budget cuts down the road, while increasing the city's deficit.


Come out with an actual plan.

I heard Ward Sutherland on the radio and I think he said it’s a 10% reduction off the taxes for last year. That’s significant. I thought it was 10% off the price for this year, which would hardly make a dent in the larger increases.

[Roughneck]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

Second of all, this is just a PR relations move and an attempt to kick the concept of budget cuts down the road, while increasing the city's deficit.

The city can run a deficit now? When was that changed in the MGA?

[chemgear]

I get the desire for arts investment and throwing money around wherever you can, but a hell of a time to do it. Knowing that you're going be the sandblasting all business across the city with overspending year after year.

https://www.thestar.com/calgary/2018...-of-money.html

CADA’s 2018 budget is $6.4 million, and a one-time increase included in the city’s four-year budget will put it at $11.4 million over the next four years.

I think more people want to put food on their table for their children instead of buying art.”

[FlameOn]

I'm up $48/mo or $576 on the year, 12% increase. How is it my assessed value is so far off? I have the exact same home (builder and floorplan) a street down currently selling for $100k less than I paid for it and it's been on the market >6 months.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by FlameOn

I'm up $48/mo or $576 on the year, 12% increase. How is it my assessed value is so far off? I have the exact same home (builder and floorplan) a street down currently selling for $100k less than I paid for it and it's been on the market >6 months.

The assessed values are wrong every where I think. I haven’t been able to confirm, but I’m pretty sure that’s the root of my 61% increase. There are a couple ridiculous things about that. First of all, that’s an enormous increase, but admittedly that’s my problem and I don’t expect other people to care.

More importantly though, that effectively means the city has under collected for years on my property. I know what the prior owners paid, and it was close to the assessed value this year, but evidently the assessed value was way less than that for a long time. So for a city that constantly has to increase taxes because they don’t collect enough, that adds up.

The other problem is now. The city increased my assessed value, and left the neighbours around me back where they were. That just illustrates how terrible the methodology of getting these property values in the first place. There might be some differences between my home and my neighbours, and we all have those idiosyncratic differences. But we’re talking ~25% here, and that’s just a poor system. For the city as a whole it means more years of under collecting on these other places though, which means lower revenue for who knows how long. I guess until the property is sold and the next owners get the sticker shock I did?

To me it’s obvious that this current system has a lot of issues though. I would expect in this day and age that the city would have a reliable way to determine these values, but what I see in practice is something different.

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by topfiverecords

Council could go in the green bin.

Is bull #### allowed in the green bin? I guess it makes good fertilizer...

[soreshins]

Originally Posted by The Yen Man

From my anecdotal observations, individual departments don't ever not spend any money in their budgets if they have surpluses for fear that if they save the money, come next year, they get their budgets reduced. So you have departments that spend needlessly so they can hit their annual budget amounts allocated to them.

The city has to just just take a harder stance and start cutting some of these, and tell departments tough, you're going to have to do more with less. That's how private sector companies work. Why would the city operate any differently?

I know for a fact that this does occur

[para transit fellow]

Originally Posted by You Need a Thneed

An RFP such as this would be for the purpose of saving money due to volume buying. You aren’t going to spend more by inviting vendors to compete against each other.

Is that not what I said?

[para transit fellow]

Originally Posted by The Yen Man

From my anecdotal observations, individual departments don't ever not spend any money in their budgets if they have surpluses for fear that if they save the money, come next year, they get their budgets reduced. So you have departments that spend needlessly so they can hit their annual budget amounts allocated to them.

The city has to just just take a harder stance and start cutting some of these, and tell departments tough, you're going to have to do more with less. That's how private sector companies work. Why would the city operate any differently?

Since the city has gone to zero-base budgeting, I don't believe this happens as often