{"id":26242,"date":"2020-03-26T19:50:28","date_gmt":"2020-03-26T23:50:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=26242"},"modified":"2020-04-03T17:07:31","modified_gmt":"2020-04-03T21:07:31","slug":"region-town-declare-emergency-as-aurora-announces-tax-relief","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/region-town-declare-emergency-as-aurora-announces-tax-relief\/","title":{"rendered":"Region, Town declare Emergency as Aurora announces tax relief"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Town of Aurora is pledging tax relief for residents\nand businesses alike in response to the global COVID-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aurora announced new measures on Friday, just three days\nbefore the Region of York followed the Province \u2013 and the Town\u2019s \u2013 lead in\ndeclaring a State of Emergency.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The move at the Regional level came Monday as local\nhealth services grappled with the first positive case of COVID-19 acquired\nthrough local transmission (defined as individuals who did not have close\ncontact with a travel-related case or any known case of COVID-19), as well as\nthe first York Region case that ultimately proved fatal \u2013 a travel-related case\nof a female from Markham in her 70s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDuring these times of uncertainty and rapid change our top priority has\nalways been, and will remain, the health and safety of those who call York\nRegion home,\u201d said York Region Chair Wayne Emmerson. \u201cWe are in unprecedented\nterritory, but rest assured your government continues to take decisive and\nmeaningful action to protect citizens, businesses and our Regional staff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYork Region provides vital services to 1.2 million residents. To help\nmitigate the spread and ensure residents continue to receive critical public\nservices, all non-essential Regional employees who can work remotely will do\nso. Services essential to residents will continue. We are in changing and\nchallenging times, but together we can flatten the curve and keep our\ncommunities safe. When we all come together, we are stronger.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The continued measures to help flatten the curve,\nincluding the Province\u2019s decision to close all workplaces not deemed essential\non Monday afternoon, have proved challenging, and further measures at the\nmunicipal level are intended to help ease the burden.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 \u201cDuring this\ndifficult time, I have regularly been in touch with our community to listen and\nlearn about the concerns that we now face due to the COVID-19 crisis,\u201d said\nMayor Tom Mrakas in a statement. \u201cWe recognize that options need to be made\navailable to ease the financial burdens on families and businesses. We are\nproviding our residents and businesses the option to suspend their tax\npayments, to give them the opportunity to assess their finances and budget accordingly.\nWe will continue to assess the COVID-19 crisis and ensure that all stakeholders\nare informed of any changes or updates.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The second installment of the residential interim tax\nbill that was due on Tuesday, April 21, 2020 will be deferred for approximately\ntwo months to Tuesday, June 23, 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Penalties on taxes will be temporarily suspended until\nJune 30, 2020. The Town will also offer the same two-month deferral to those on\na pre-authorized payment plan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf your property taxes are paid by your mortgage\ncompany, it’s important for you to forward your property tax bill to your\nmortgage company for payment,\u201d said the Town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Commercial tax bills may be deferred by approval from the\nTreasurer. Commercial clients can email their request to info@aurora.ca and\nmust demonstrate in writing that they have passed on this leniency to their\ntenants. These requests will be assessed on a case-by-case basis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFor commercial properties\u2026they must demonstrate they are\npassing that leniency onto the tenant,\u201d says Mayor Mrakas. \u201cMany times, what\nwe\u2019re seeing is the businesses that are being affected by this and are having\nto shut down and they\u2019re not making any money, they are not the owners of the\nproperty. They are paying rent and we want to ensure that there is some kind of\nway to ensure that they have some relief because they are being hit real hard\nand we want to ensure when we get past this they will still be around and their\nbusinesses will be able to get back up and running. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis was one of the measures we wanted to make sure that whatever relief we did provide to property owners on the commercial side that they do pass that along to their tenants as well.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Brock Weir <\/strong><\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Town of Aurora is pledging tax relief for residents and businesses alike in response to the global COVID-19 pandemic. Aurora announced new measures on Friday, just three days before the Region of York followed the Province \u2013 and the Town\u2019s \u2013 lead in declaring a State of Emergency. The move at the Regional level […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_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}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26242","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\/p3D2k4-6Pg","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-14 21:39:26","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\/26242","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=26242"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26242\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26242"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26242"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26242"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}