TIME TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT YOUR PROPERTY ASSESSMENT?

Are you concerned about rising assessments and taxes?

Is your assessment affected by high-priced sales in your area?

Do you want to do something about MPAC’s unwillingness to reveal the properties it uses to assign a value to yours?

Do you want to force MPAC to carry forward reductions in assessments from one year to the next?

WHAT CAN YOU DO?

1. YOU CAN CONTACT THE OMBUDSMAN of Ontario, Andre Marin.

2. YOU CAN SUPPORT THE WORK OF WRAFT (WATERFRONT RESIDENTS AFTER FAIR TAXATION)

3. YOU CAN WRITE A LETTER TO YOUR MPP

1) CONTACT THE OMBUDSMAN: Andre Marin has launched an investigation into whether the Municipal Property Assessment Corporation’s process for valuing properties in Ontario is fair and transparent. He would like people to tell him their specific concerns about the property assessment process in Ontario. If you have been unable to learn the facts relating to the assessment your property, you could focus on that. If you had your assessment reduced by the staff of MPAC or by the Assessment Review Board, only to find that the reduction was ignored in the next year’s assessment, that is of concern to Mr. Marin. He needs specific information, based on real experience.

a) If you have information and can assist in his investigation, call 1-866-623-SORT (7678)
b) Or visit www.ombudsman.on.ca ; click “Special Ombudsman Response Team (SORT)”; and at the bottom of the page click “SORT Information Form (Online Form); then fill out the form and submit it
c) Or write a letter to
Ombudsman of Ontario
125 Queens Park
Toronto, ON
M5S 2C7
And mark the envelope “SORT Investigation MPAC” and in your letter be sure to include you first and last names, your address including postal code, your telephone number, your e-mail address (if you have one)

2) SUPPORT WRAFT (Waterfront Residents After Fair Taxation). WRAFT is a coalition of concerned waterfront associations in Ontario. They are the only group to have taken up the cause of opposing waterfront assessment in a concerted, effective, well-organized way. They want to halt any unfair shift of tax onto waterfront (and shore area) properties. They are looking for ways to mitigate rising property taxes. They are working to reform the way property taxes are allocated. Their aims and methods are clearly explained on their website – www.wraft.com -- under “Mission”.
As an individual, you can support their work by sending them a donation, and your cottage association can support them by joining and in subsequent years by sending them the equivalent of a membership fee. Lobbying the government, doing research, analyzing data all costs money. If WRAFT is to continue its work, they need financial help.

3) WRITE A LETTER TO YOUR MPP. These should detail your personal experience with assessments, and your sense of why the system is unfair. The letter might include these points (in your own words and in relation to your circumstances):
- a review of the province’s property taxation system is needed
- your property taxes have increased much more than your income has increased
- your taxes on your cottage property have increased more than the taxes on your permanent home, even though you get fewer services at your cottage
- the government delayed the 2004 assessment realizing that there was much wrong with the property tax system. Last year’s provincial budget promised to address the problems. Nothing has been done. Tax increases should be deferred until the system has been fixed.

To get the postal and e-mail addresses of your MPP, please go to www.gov.on.ca or call your local constituency office. You should write to your MPP in cottage country and also to your MPP for your permanent home. Garfield Dunlop, MPP Simcoe-North, can be reached at:
482 Elizabeth St
Midland, ON
L4R 1Z8
E-mail: garfield.dunlop@pc.ola.org