By John Francis
Northern Bruce Peninsula’s Mayor, Milt McIver, goes out of his way to spend time with voters. He listens very carefully to what they tell him. One of the things that he has heard loud and clear over the last few years is that “tourism should pay for tourism”. Ratepayers don’t want their property taxes to go towards managing and mitigating tourism.
But how much does tourism cost? And how much does the tourist industry pay in municipal taxes?
The tax question is easy. Commercial properties are expected to pay $220,139 in municipal taxes this year (out of $7.588 million), so the contribution of the tourist industry will be somewhat less than that.
But how much does tourism cost? A Treasurer’s Report on the subject is being prepared but here’s a thumbnail summary:
Registering/regulating STAs and collecting Municipal Accommodation Tax from them costs $228,500. That should be more than offset by the MAT collected.
MNBP’s Fire and Emergency Response department is expected to cost $587,500 in operating expenses plus $430,000 in capital purchases. That adds up to over a million dollars. What percentage of that should be paid out of tourism revenues? What percentage of call-outs were for non-residents? Would that percentage be a fair way of assigning costs?
OPP policing is projected to cost us $1,331,000 this year. (BTW, that doesn’t include Highway 6, which is policed “free” because it is a provincial highway.) What percentage of police call-outs pertain to non-residents? Would that percentage represent a fair way of assigning costs?
Bylaw Enforcement is projected to cost $614,050 this year. What percentage of bylaw enforcement should be assigned to tourism? Hard to be sure but twenty years ago, bylaw enforcement was done entirely by one person, who was also the building inspector. So do the math from there…
Paid parking revenues cover slightly more than 25% of the costs of Bylaw Enforcement; the remainder is paid out of municipal taxes.
Our landfill sites will have operating budgets of $318,800 this year. That does not include the potentially huge expense of outfitting a new landfill site when our current ones are full. But what percentage of the volume of garbage in our municipality can be assigned to tourism? What percentage of the cost of creating a new dump? What percentage of the cost of recycling?
The information building at Ferndale is easy — $21,500 in operating costs. Then there’s the cost of staffing it and the two information facilities in Tobermory. Over $100,000 all told, and all of it should be assigned to tourism.
Then there’s the cost of installing and emptying garbage and recycling containers around our villages, setting up washrooms and porta-potties and building/managing parking lots. Then there’s park maintenance, the municipal campground and the Lion’s Head Shuttle…
So how much does tourism cost? It’s hard to calculate a precise number but “well over a million per year” would be a rough guess. Clearly the $220,139 we get in commercial taxes does not begin to cover it.
