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Greetings Beloved Community,

It has come to our attention that without strong protest there will be a dramatic change in Metchosin Tax exemption for non-profit organizations in Metchosin. The Major and council appear to be determined to push through a decision to cease to provide tax exemptions. This will result in an annual tax bill of a minimum of $14,943 to a likely $33,539.

Judy Rann, Scott Dolff, and Ed Bennington have actively been gathering information and advice as well as contacting the mayor and/or council members. Please feel free to talk to them for further clarification and information. Judy and her dad have provide some key points:

  1. Despite concerns that were raised at the last council meeting, the two councillors and Mayor that voted for the change have currently expressed they will continue with the plan.
  2. Any member of council that voted for the change can bring it back to council, you only need one.  Because there is no meeting on Thanksgiving this has to happen on October 20th in order for them to go through the process to have it changed
  3. If no change has happened by October 31st it is done, there is no appealing

What to do?

  1. Getting as many people as possible to attending the October 20th council meeting to speak at public participation.
  2. Have every member of these non profits, their friends etc. write letters to the Mayor and Council - these can be respectful but also need to be hard hitting.
  3. Call the members of the council.

Scott also has raised some excellent points which you may want to mention in your letter or conversation with the mayor and/or council member.

  • I would be interested in the land area that they are assessing for permissive tax in our case. I'm assuming it includes our parking lot, which is a public park and ride, as well as the greenspace around the church, which is being entered into as an environmental conservation space for the Bilston Creek Conservation Corridor, and is largely riparian zone, as well as graveyard, old church grounds, and former co-op building, which have been forms of community service for a century+. This not to mention the obvious regarding our main building, which, in addition to all the other community benefits it offers (beyond our congregation), is the municipality's emergency shelter.
  • We might also want to marshal all of our tenants and renters, letting them know we will need to raise rental costs by 100% to offset the taxes. (Dawne is contacting all our renters to ask them to email or call the mayor and/or council.)
  • I get we have a budget crunch with a low tax base, but it seems pretty obviously short-sighted to put all of our local community service groups out of existence (which will surely happen) to shore up Metchosin finances.

I have attached a number of documents. One is an email sent out by the  Association for the Protection of Rural Metchosin (APRM) to its members with an excellent summary of the situation which includes a suggested template for a letter/email. I have also attached examples of other letters already sent to council, and the report sent to council from the staff on the tax exemption (referred to as Permissive Tax Exemptions). In this report the following statement is made:

Anglican Church — The local churches meet Councils strategic priority of cultural and community activity building based on the events held and congregating of residents in the community. A star was added to the fiscal need section, as the church itself does not have significant resources, however the Anglican Church of Canada has significant resources.

The staff are obviously under a false impression of the financial resources available to the Anglican Church of Canada. The National Church is experiencing the same financial crisis as every parish and diocese and are in the process of making extremely difficult decisions on ways to reduce their budget. Even if they did have the financial resources, we as a local parish would not have access to those funds.

I know it’s a lot to read, if you are short on time, I recommend the APRM email and the staff report.

I urge you to contact the mayor and/or council to express your concerns.

Yours in Christ,

Lynn

Rev. Dr. Lynn Mills ec
St. Mary of the Incarnation, Metchosin, BC
lmills@bc.anglican.ca
778-533-1315

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