North Shore tax location pricey but necessary
SATURDAY MORNING EDITORIAL — When you go to pay your property taxes this year, keep in mind getting into City Hall could be a challenge. The lineups can be pretty intense just before the deadline.
File photo.
This year, it will be tougher than usual — the intersection in front of City Hall is a mess. Work is being done to improve the intersection and getting through it is slow going these days.
City council decided this week to provide an alternative site for paying taxes . So, space will be set up in the McArthur Island Sports and Events Centre.
It won’t be cheap. The bill will be $45,000.
That didn’t sit well with some members of council, who thought people should just get used to paying their taxes online. That’s not an unreasonable expectation, but it’s not reality.
About 9,000 people prefer to pay their taxes in person. Telling them they should do it online instead of in person at City Hall isn’t going to convince them. They would still show up at City Hall.
Parking would be a nightmare, lineups would be around the corner, and there would be a lot of unhappy taxpayers. And voters.
So providing another location is an inconvenient and expensive necessity. One wonders why, when the contract was let for the work on the intersection, council didn’t take the tax deadline into consideration and schedule the work accordingly, but so be it.
Taxpayers who insist on paying their taxes in person, as well as everyone else, will be paying a little extra for the privilege this year.
ArmchairMayor.ca 
$45,000 for all 9,000 personal payers is only $5 each, but as we’re all paying the $45k it’s less than $5 each for each of us.
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This is just another example of council being derelict in watching what city staff are doing.
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