Our Speaker Kyle Fletcher

Posted by Craig Henderson
Kyle Fletcher presented an overview of municipal taxation in the City of Calgary.
Altus Group's Kyle Fletcher
Club member Chris Day introduced Kyle Fletcher, Executive VP of the Altus Group. Altus Group is a global team of more than 2,500 professionals across North America, Europe and Asia Pacific who bringing transparency and insight into every aspect of the real estate life cycle.
 
Chris' informative presentation provided a current state overview of municipal taxation in the City of Calgary. Not surprisingly,
the recent recession has caused havoc with the city's municipal tax base, as the high vacancy rate in the downtown core has eroded commercial tax revenues to the city. The natural consequence of this is that the tax burden has shifted onto smaller businesses, many of them family owned, further from the city centre.
 
This comes at an awkward time, as the city is in the final year of a six-year commercial tax transition, in which taxes on business income are being replaced with a tax system based on commercial property values. For example, this is hurting companies that own vacant land, or have vacant rental spaces, as these are now subject to full taxation.
 
The city is doing what it can to ameloriate the effects of the macroeconomic trends buffeting the province, but is constrained by the taxation system. Its 2017 Municipal Non-Residential Phased Tax Program (PTP) was a one-year program, now extended to 2018, that was put in place to assist non-residential properties impacted by large shifts in market value in 2017. Under the PTP, non-residential municipal tax increases were limited to five per cent, but the limit only applies to the city's portion of the overall tax bill.
 
Thanking our Speaker Kyle Fletcher
These revenue problems are being compounded by the increased difficulty in obtaining information from the city's information exchange, but Altus Group has helped numerous clients in lowering their tax bills through better access to information. Our speaker presented a number of issues that the city is trying to address to maintain the efficiency and fairness of the city's municipal tax system.
 
  1.  The inexorable pressure to increase spending to keep up with city residents' demands for services.
  2. Managing the shift of revenue sources from the city's downtown core to outlying business areas.
  3. Maintaining openness and transparency in the city's assessment department.
At the conculsion of a question and answer session, Garth Toombs thanked our speaker with a certificate acknowledging the club's donation to CAWST, given in appreciation of Kyle's presentation.