ANTIGONISH — Dustin Swinkels shook his head in frustration
Friday as he explained that his organization has run out of options.
“It never should of come to this," the president of the
Antigonish-Guysborough Federation of Agriculture said, referring to a tax
dispute between the Town of Antigonish and Antigonish County over a piece of
property the federation rents.
“We’ve been trying for the past nine years to get this
resolved.
This is a property that benefits both the residents of the
town and county, and should never have been listed as taxable."
On Tuesday, the federation will appear before a judge in Antigonish
seeking a judicial review of a decision by Antigonish town council to sell the
property, which is owned by the county, at a tax sale on Oct. 3 unless the
county pays $330,000 in back taxes by then.
The county rents the property, located within town
boundaries, to the federation for $1 a year.
The rental agreement is a 30-year, renewable lease.
The site includes barns, a fenced area and canteen and is
used for the annual exhibition, a weekly farmers market, livestock shows, 4-H
activities and horsemanship events.
It is the only exhibition property in the province that is
listed by as being taxable.
Mayor Carl Chisholm said Friday that town council’s hands are
tied. He said it had to proceed with a tax sale because Municipal Affairs
Minister John MacDonell sent them a letter in February directing them to sell
any property on which property taxes hadn’t been for three years. In addition,
Chisholm said the Municipal Government Act doesn’t allow the town to write off
taxes unless it is determined they can’t be collected.
Meanwhile, Owen McCarron, Antigonish County’s deputy warden,
said the county would have paid a tax bill if it had properly reflected the
town’s costs associated with the property.
That cost would have been much lower than the $330,000
the town is seeking, McCarron said.
The mayor and deputy warden referred to the situation as “unfortunate"
and said the dispute is throwing a wrench into efforts to build a constructive
relationship between the two municipalities.
So what created the impasse?
In 2003, the Property Valuation Services Corp. ruled that the
exhibition grounds property was taxable at a commercial rate because the
property was being rented by a third party.
However, it noted that if the property had been used for
municipal purposes or if it had been owned by the federation, it would have
been listed as nontaxable.
To have that ruling overturned, the county would have had to
appeal it to the Nova Scotia Supreme Court at that time, said Lloyd MacLeod,
senior commercial manager for the non-profit corporation tasked with assessing
taxes in the province.
Or the two municipalities could have agreed to have the
local MLA present a private member’s bill that would have exempted the property
from municipal taxes.
While past and present MLAs have been willing to table such a
bill, that didn’t happen back then because there was the possibility the two
municipalities would amalgamate, McCarron said.
The amalgamation became contentious and the Nova Scotia
Utility and Review Board threw the issue out, leaving the two municipalities in
place.
Meanwhile, because the property was listed as commercial
taxable, the town levied an annual tax bill, and the county refused to pay
taxes on a property it didn’t consider taxable.
In April, the county offered to pay about $56,000 to cover
the tax bill, but that offer was rejected by the town. On Tuesday, McCarron
said the county would have been willing to pay more if the town hadn’t
proceeded with the tax sale.
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