Talk of tax revolt simmers across RM of Mckillop

Jason Wilker has no plans to pay his taxes this year.

Neither do many of his neighbours in the hamlet of Colesdale Park South, where residents are mobilizing against a huge tax hike recently passed by the Rural Municipality of Mckillop. It’s part of the anti-tax outcry rising up along the eastern shore of Last Mountain Lake.

“We don’t feel that this RM deserves our money,” said Wilker. “We want a new council.”

Wilker attended a Saturday meeting at the community centre in his lakeside hamlet’s park. He said residents went over their options for opposing the tax hike — including potential legal action and calls for intervention by the minister of government relations. On Aug. 10, the RM council voted to increase the residential mill rate 87 per cent and slapped on an $850 base tax. The result: Property taxes will rise 130 per cent on a residential property assessed at $350,000.

“I think most people were under the same agreement: That it’s outrageous, and that we weren’t going to just pay them,” said Greg Adelman, who also attended the Saturday meeting.

Reeve Howard Arndt said council is listening to residents.

He said the RM is trying to find a way to make the burden “financially easier.”

“That’s the commitment we’ve made,” said the reeve. “I don’t know what success we’re going to have.”

But he noted that council’s hands are tied by the legal requirement to run a balanced budget.

“I understand their frustration and anger because I’m feeling the same thing,” he said, noting that his acreage will also see a “significant” property tax increase.

Arndt has said the tax hike is needed to plug a hole left by mounting tax arrears, unexpected expenses, legal fees and the costly takeover of a treatment plant at a beleaguered development. He said the RM’S administrator did not reveal a $420,000 expense item until weeks before the tax announcement.

On Thursday, the RM’S council voted to end her contract. Arndt said councillors had “lost confidence in her.”

He said he and other councillors took time to discuss matters with residents after that meeting. The exchange, in Adelman’s telling, was “extremely tense.”

“Things were getting a little heated ...” he said. “Some people were asking ‘How come you don’t resign?’”

Adelman said Colesdale Park South ratepayers are now weighing legal action. His neighbour, Devon Hack, has already contacted a lawyer and built a list of 17 residents who want to join in.

“We’ve informed the other hamlets that if they want to come on board we’re more than willing to take others,” Hack said.

Like Wilker and Adelman, Hack said he won’t pay his taxes until the prospective legal process reaches a conclusion.

“I’m planning not to pay because it is not justifiable,” he said. “You can’t just double the price and expect nothing to happen.”

Arndt said he’s not aware of what the basis for such a lawsuit would be. He said he’s confident that there hasn’t been any fraud on the part of the RM’S staff.

Colesdale Park South is one of a number of cottage hamlets along Last Mountain Lake, about a 45minute drive northwest of Regina. The hamlet of Alta Vista is planning a similar resident meeting in the coming days, according to its board chair, Steve Wolos.

“Everybody’s totally against it,” he said of the tax increase. “It’s like a tax revolt.”

He said the meeting will solicit resident opinion, but he’s already hearing the same sentiments that surfaced in Colesdale Park South on Saturday.

“The people I’m talking to are saying the same thing: We’re not paying.”

Dan Griffin, board chair for the hamlet of Uhl’s Bay, said similar ideas are surfacing among his residents. He said the provincial government should step in.

“I think they should come in and take direct control,” he said, an idea that also found currency at the Colesdale Park South meeting.

Arndt said he’s well aware of the brewing tax revolt. He said that residents thinking of not paying their taxes should be aware that it will put further pressure on an already cash-strapped RM. He noted that the budget only takes shape halfway through the year, with the RM eating into reserves that could create cash flow issues if revenues don’t come in to refill them.

“If it goes on for too long its going to be a real struggle,” he said of the protest.

Wilker said he and his neighbours were mostly low-key, lawabiding taxpayers before news of the hike. He said the looming battle has awakened a new political consciousness in their community.

“None of us really cared before,” Wilker said. “We just shut up and paid our taxes. But something like this is bringing us together.”