2018 Property Tax

[81MC]

Originally Posted by chemgear

Unions baby!

A manager isn’t a union gig.

Want to save money? Let’s get rid of everything we don’t need. Bury your own trash, free compost and heat! Sweep the street in front of your own house, pull straws to determine which neighbour gets the pile of rubble in front of his house. Take a lovely walk the roadside shoulder and get your photo in front of the world famous ‘big grey wall’! While your enjoying the beautiful sites of the soviet era lack’o’culture district, don’t forget to get your exercise in and pull those weeds as you go! Take a lovely bike ride along the river front, just make sure it’s not on your vintage fixie...those broken chunks of concrete are an adrenaline junkies dream! If winter sports are your thing, why not hit up one of the many local flat pieces of land for a skate? Learn how to make your very own ice rink (hoses not provided).
And don’t worry, our neighbourhoods are a great place to raise a family. A lack of pathways ensures your children will get to play Frogger everyday! And we treat our neighbours as people. No bylaw officers, no problem...what are pit bulls and violence for?! We even offer transit to no where, because we believe money should stay in your pocket!
“Calgary, 2020 - Hey, we saved!”


I get it, taxes really suck. And I feel for these businesses. I also feel like it’s time citizens understand the things they have cost money, and maybe it’s time to redistribute where that money comes from. I’m sure the city can work to save money, and they absolutley need to. But vilifying the entire ‘city’ as business haters and dream killers when you have a cute shop in what was very recently ‘the greatest neighbourhood in North America’ just irkes the #### out of me. Yeah, that property maybe IS valued that high, look at what people pay to get a bachelor apartment down the street, and your two story storefront commercial building seems like a pretty good value to me.

[para transit fellow]

Originally Posted by DiNaMo

It goes beyond just employees as well. A couple years ago I remember browsing the City of Calgary Merx website and there was a RFQ for 400 ipads, accessories, and warranty to be used by the door to door Census people.

My initial thought was the absurdity of the city needing 400 ipads and secondly everyone knows Apple maintains tight control of their pricing.

My back of the envelope math worked out to it costing something like $400k and instead of having someone from the city take half an hour to order from Apple, it goes through the whole RFQ process and not sure what margins are like for this type of contract but I assume it ends up costing atleast another $100k.

............

Just had a look and I see theres an RFP for "Supply and delivery of pet food to be used for the cats and dogs at The City of Calgary Community Standards Animal Services Centre." You really mean theres no capable employee with a cargo van that can make a quarterly run to petland?

I guess I mis-understood that the point of an RFP was to get a product or service at the best value for money (lowest cost vs best level of service)

[para transit fellow]

oops double post

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by GGG

It would be a person with a planning degree who has knowledge on how to best incorporate walkability into various city designs

Someone picks where pedestrian crossings are used and how they are designed. How many pedestrian overpasses also end up having a fence in the middle of the road to prevent Jay-walking and force people to use the overpass. I would assume a walking coordinator would ensure that these types of projects are done properly. Also probably a lot of work with developers to ensure that walkability is in their designs. So pathways that link between house to significantly shorten walks to services.

To be it is important for the design of walking infrastructure isn’t just put a sidewalk on the side of all of the roads. Have a person responsible for this will lead to it being better.

If you just titled this position as planner no one would blink. That is what the city is adding. One more planner to the planning department.

How many planners did it take to put the crosswalks for the peace bridge not near the bridge? Do we need a walking coordinator to make sure common sense gets used?

[Regorium]

Originally Posted by bizaro86

How many planners did it take to put the crosswalks for the peace bridge not near the bridge? Do we need a walking coordinator to make sure common sense gets used?

I've posted about this before over the years because it's always interesting to me.

My buddy was part of planning this project. His team's original design put a crosswalk at the end of the bridge.

Druh Farrell's office killed the idea because it would slow down Memorial drive (three pedestrian crossings in a row), and the cost to install an extra crossing was too high (peace bridge budget was a political hot potato). Likely there were some community flyers that were sent out as well, and the rich people of Sunnyside on the river didn't want the extra traffic.

So the planners were fine, the politicians were not.

Edit: Just chatting with my buddy. After the crosswalk was removed from the design, he wrote a memo to the team to build rocks or trees in order to prevent jaywalkers. However, as mentioned above, the budget for the Peace Bridge project was already so tight so they didn't do it. Of course, a year later, the City planners are being blasted again all over the media for all the jaywalkers and suddenly there was room in the budget for what you see today.

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by Regorium

I've posted about this before over the years because it's always interesting to me.

My buddy was part of planning this project. His team's original design put a crosswalk at the end of the bridge.

Druh Farrell's office killed the idea because it would slow down Memorial drive (three pedestrian crossings in a row), and the cost to install an extra crossing was too high (peace bridge budget was a political hot potato). Likely there were some community flyers that were sent out as well, and the rich people of Sunnyside on the river didn't want the extra traffic.

So the planners were fine, the politicians were not.

Edit: Just chatting with my buddy. After the crosswalk was removed from the design, he wrote a memo to the team to build rocks or trees in order to prevent jaywalkers. However, as mentioned above, the budget for the Peace Bridge project was already so tight so they didn't do it. Of course, a year later, the City planners are being blasted again all over the media for all the jaywalkers and suddenly there was room in the budget for what you see today.

I'd actually be fine with more planners and less politicians...

[You Need a Thneed]

Originally Posted by para transit fellow

I guess I mis-understood that the point of an RFP was to get a product or service at the best value for money (lowest cost vs best level of service)

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.

[CgyFlamesftw]

Regarding the pay of city workers. My friend use to work for the City transit selling passes at the downtown location making 75k a year, all while attending MRU. And he did this while studying all night at this job, sell a pass here or there every couple hours. Pretty ####in sad id say.

[81MC]

Originally Posted by DiNaMo

It goes beyond just employees as well. A couple years ago I remember browsing the City of Calgary Merx website and there was a RFQ for 400 ipads, accessories, and warranty to be used by the door to door Census people.

My initial thought was the absurdity of the city needing 400 ipads and secondly everyone knows Apple maintains tight control of their pricing.

My back of the envelope math worked out to it costing something like $400k and instead of having someone from the city take half an hour to order from Apple, it goes through the whole RFQ process and not sure what margins are like for this type of contract but I assume it ends up costing atleast another $100k.

............

Just had a look and I see theres an RFP for "Supply and delivery of pet food to be used for the cats and dogs at The City of Calgary Community Standards Animal Services Centre." You really mean theres no capable employee with a cargo van that can make a quarterly run to petland?

I don’t disagree with your sentiment, at all. We all know it’s easier and cheaper most of the time to jus my go get the product.
However, municipalities are bound by several things, least of which are the CFTA and the NWPTA. If someone was to just go ahead and order 400 iPads from wherever, they would be in violation.
And imagine if PetSmart, PetWorld, Dexters, TailBlazers etc. found out Animal Services was just calling up PetLand for their dog food? Not only is that a flaggarant violation, you have multiple local business owners who have lost the right to bid competitively and would have a valid reason to be pissed off and file a complaint.
I know it’s frustrating to see apparently silly practical application of laws and trade agreements, but they do exists for a reason. Municipalities have this crazy balancing act with this kind of stuff, and one way or another they’re going to piss someone off and will always be ‘idiots’.

[Weitz]

I remember a few years back when a certain government contracted my company to design an RFP for them. Well that was not a cheap endeavour. The funniest part was when we finally finished the RFP to the scope the government wanted which made absolutely zero sense they got no bids from any companies (we couldn’t bid due to designing the rfp). So they single sourced the contract to us...

[Mr.Coffee]

I see a lot of people defending the city and spending but it really is a problem. Any person can justify any cost, but at the end of the day the math isn’t working well. Property taxes for residential are going to go up. If people think THIS year is bad???? Wait until next year or the year after. The anger of no pipeline and the industry death spell will be at peak pissed off-ness at that point.

As I’ve been saying for awhile, Calgary is in big trouble. Why not face reality with budget austerity rather than continue to plunge into debt? If the city came and said look all city employees are taking a 5% haircut on pay (like, everyone). That would free up a ####load of cash and go a long way with people who on the private side or small business side have seen much more severe consequences of BC and Canada and Quebec ####ing us around. Time to join the club City of Calgary. I mean it’s either now or later, but, you will be.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by Mr.Coffee

I see a lot of people defending the city and spending but it really is a problem. Any person can justify any cost, but at the end of the day the math isn’t working well. Property taxes for residential are going to go up. If people think THIS year is bad???? Wait until next year or the year after. The anger of no pipeline and the industry death spell will be at peak pissed off-ness at that point.

As I’ve been saying for awhile, Calgary is in big trouble. Why not face reality with budget austerity rather than continue to plunge into debt? If the city came and said look all city employees are taking a 5% haircut on pay (like, everyone). That would free up a ####load of cash and go a long way with people who on the private side or small business side have seen much more severe consequences of BC and Canada and Quebec ####ing us around. Time to join the club City of Calgary. I mean it’s either now or later, but, you will be.

Try being a small business and a homeowner.

You want to screw me over?

Get in line.

[curves2000]

There are a lot of ways the city can cut costs and real spending, we don't need to rehash everything here in detail.

The city needs straight across the board spending cut in a real % terms. Call it 5% Call it 10% whatever. Projects need to be delayed, certain perks that some city employees get need to be trimmed. I am not talking about petty stuff but crap that doesn't need to happen like certain uniform requirements for transit, police, fire etc, technology upgrades, fleet and transportation expenses etc.

The managers of managers of managers needs to be trimmed and certain services should be given to the private sector. Certain jobs can't be filled with new employees and certain employees need to be retrained and moved to different divisions.

There is plenty of waste and lots of things that need to happen but people always get the jitters with the scare tactics used by the councilors and mayor. Relax!

[Slava]

Originally Posted by Locke

Try being a small business and a homeowner.

You want to screw me over?

Get in line.

This is what it all comes down to in my opinion; governments at all levels need to recognize there is only one taxpayer. It all comes out of the same wallet.

[GGG]

One thing to remember is that 5 years ago in the boom we had the lowest provincial taxes ever, the lowest federal taxes ever and the amoung the lowest residential municipal taxes in Canada’s history. We also had the highest median incomes in Canada by a large margin.

These things don’t exist anymore we are rebounding to the mean and that requires a substantial increase in taxation as taxes shift from business to residential. Yes continuous cost cutting should be pursued and wages should be frozen until they are back in line with a post boom Calgary but fundamentally when you count on business for over 50% of taxes and the value is cut by 1/2 you have lost about 12.5% or so of your total tax base.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by Slava

This is what it all comes down to in my opinion; governments at all levels need to recognize there is only one taxpayer. It all comes out of the same wallet.

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.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by GGG

One thing to remember is that 5 years ago in the boom we had the lowest provincial taxes ever, the lowest federal taxes ever and the amoung the lowest residential municipal taxes in Canada’s history. We also had the highest median incomes in Canada by a large margin.

These things don’t exist anymore we are rebounding to the mean and that requires a substantial increase in taxation as taxes shift from business to residential. Yes continuous cost cutting should be pursued and wages should be frozen until they are back in line with a post boom Calgary but fundamentally when you count on business for over 50% of taxes and the value is cut by 1/2 you have lost about 12.5% or so of your total tax base.

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.

[Nufy]

how much could a few of these save us ??


https://imgur.com/gallery/frb5n7D

[chemgear]

https://calgaryherald.com/news/local...operty-tax-hit

More than 8,000 Calgary businesses — about 64 per cent of all commercial properties in the city — will face double-digit tax increases this year, according to city data.

[DiNaMo]

I don’t disagree with your sentiment, at all. We all know it’s easier and cheaper most of the time to jus my go get the product.
However, municipalities are bound by several things, least of which are the CFTA and the NWPTA. If someone was to just go ahead and order 400 iPads from wherever, they would be in violation.
And imagine if PetSmart, PetWorld, Dexters, TailBlazers etc. found out Animal Services was just calling up PetLand for their dog food? Not only is that a flaggarant violation, you have multiple local business owners who have lost the right to bid competitively and would have a valid reason to be pissed off and file a complaint.
I know it’s frustrating to see apparently silly practical application of laws and trade agreements, but they do exists for a reason. Municipalities have this crazy balancing act with this kind of stuff, and one way or another they’re going to piss someone off and will always be ‘idiots’.

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