{"id":15836,"date":"2016-11-16T18:33:48","date_gmt":"2016-11-16T23:33:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=15836"},"modified":"2016-11-16T18:33:48","modified_gmt":"2016-11-16T23:33:48","slug":"aurora-residential-increase-starts-at-projected-2-23-per-cent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/aurora-residential-increase-starts-at-projected-2-23-per-cent\/","title":{"rendered":"Aurora residential increase starts at projected 2.23 per cent"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir <\/strong><\/p>\n

Budget deliberations began this week and Aurora residents can expect to see a combined increase of 2.23 per cent on residential tax bills \u2013 for now.
\nWith talks on the Town\u2019s 2017 Capital Budget wrapped last month, Council began tackling the 2017 Operating Budget on Monday night, the component that has the most direct impact on the tax rate. Over the next few weeks as talks continue, this number typically fluctuates \u2013 often downward \u2013 before the final budget is approved and ratified at the December 13 Council meeting.
\nAhead of Monday\u2019s talks, Town Treasurer Dan Elliott offered a forecast of what the 2.23 per cent \u2013 which is the combined rate when one takes and weights the municipal, Regional, and school taxes \u2013might mean for Aurora residents.
\nCiting $770,000 as the average assessment for a typical detached house in Aurora as the baseline ($500,000 was the measure used in 2016 Budget deliberations), the average Aurora household can expect to pay $158 more on their total bill for the year ahead, $76 of which is an increase of the Town\u2019s share.
\nLooking specifically at Aurora, the municipal tax increase is currently forecast to be 2.9 per cent \u2013 or, as pitched to Council by Mr. Elliott, 1.9 per cent plus a one per cent boost to the Town\u2019s reserves.
\n\u201cThe Town is clearly transitioning from suburban to urban, from a greenfield dependency to an intensification type development mode,\u201d said Mr. Elliott, noting Aurora\u2019s 2C Developments are moving more rapidly than they anticipated and plans are in place to develop further infill and development.
\nMr. Elliott made his presentation last Tuesday as the polls began to close in the U.S. Presidential Election. This was one factor of instability Mr. Elliott said needed to be considered, along with such issues as Brexit and oil pipelines.
\n\u201cThere is a lot of nervousness in the national and international economics, but here in Aurora we need to focus on servicing our growing community,\u201d he said. \u201cWe have strong growth, a lot of people interested in living here\u2026 and need to receive the excellent services we\u2019re interested in providing to our community.\u201d
\nBut, in arriving at this 2.9 per cent, the focus was pegging things to the current inflation rate. In fact, that is what Council set staff out to do: bring the proposed budget in line with the inflation rate of 2.1 per cent.
\n\u201cYou asked us to maintain services, you asked us to fund the required increases in our fire services within that, meet the service needs of our growing community, contain the inflation and all our non-tax revenues for inflation wherever possible,\u201d said Mr. Elliott, adding the direction included \u201can extra one per cent for our fiscal longevity.\u201d
\n\u201cCouncil asked us to come in at 2.1 and we came in at 1.9, plus the other one per cent.\u201d
\nFor taxpayers though this is a solid 2.9 per cent, however it is divvied up.
\n\u201cWhat do you get in this 1.9 per cent budget? You get a well-maintained infrastructure, sustained service levels to our growing community,\u201d said. Mr. Elliott. \u201cWe have award winning community events, we continue to win awards for different things. We have a great variety of recreational and cultural opportunities for all ages, and we have got what I believed is a well-managed, fiscally sustainable community.\u201d
\nIn the years ahead, there will have to be a re-think. As Aurora reaches build out, the level of income flowing into municipal coffers from that growth will plummet and that is something that is being considered.
\n\u201cWe show a forecast of diminishing tax rate increases required to continue to fund our infrastructure each year,\u201d said Mr. Elliott, outlining long-term plans highlighted last month during Capital talks. \u201cThis year it is .6 and next year I believe it falls to .5. We do map it out for 10 years. We\u2019re good as long as we stay on that plan. If we stay on plan, it shows a healthy future.\u201d
\nThis was a point driven home by Councillor Michael Thompson.
\n\u201cWe have been very fortunate in the last number of years to have considerable growth and that considerable growth has helped us keep the tax rate down, but we are moving from a community that continues to grow to one that is built out and looking at intensification so that growth from new taxes will diminish,\u201d he said. \u201cIt is more important than ever that we continue to look at those new processes to keep tax rates low.\u201d<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Budget deliberations began this week and Aurora residents can expect to see a combined increase of 2.23 per cent on residential tax bills \u2013 for now.
\nWith talks on the Town\u2019s 2017 Capital Budget wrapped last month, Council began…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15836","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-47q","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-25 09:22:52","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15836","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15836"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15836\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15836"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15836"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15836"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}