By KEVIN BERGER, Local Journalism Initiative

A difference of opinion arose among RM of Corman Park councillors at their December 16 meeting over whether to keep a tax exemption offered on a sliding scale for large commercial developments in order to encourage such projects or to rescind the policy altogether in an effort to generate more funding for infrastructure improvements.

Ultimately, the RM councillors voted 6-3 to rescind Tax Exemption Policy FI-002, which offered tax abatements of 75, 50 and 25 per cent over three years to applicants who invest a minimum of $500,000 into the construction of permanent facility improvements and create jobs for at least five new employees.

The policy had originally been implemented in 2013 in an effort to stimulate new business development, promote business expansion and to encourage job creation within the RM.

The recommendation to rescind the tax exemption policy emerged from the administration committee meeting on December 9.

Council had previously directed administration to bring a report to council exploring various tax exemption options by the end of 2024.

Administration brought back six options to help council determine if they would like to continue the tax exemption policy. These included tweaking the policy to increase the financial threshold and number of new employees created in order to qualify, linking the value of the exemptions to building permits, and approving the exemptions on a case-by-case basis.

However, the administration committee ultimately recommended that council rescind the tax exemption policy altogether.

Division 4 Councillor David Greenwood encouraged the rest of council to vote against the recommendation, adding that he thought it was “a really bad idea.”

He suggested that the RM of Corman Park is “well-known to not be a friendly place to do business,” and anything the municipality could do to encourage development was worthwhile.

Greenwood later clarified that he had seen an article in a publication about a year and a half ago suggesting that businesses were adverse to developing within the RM of Corman Park.

He also suggested that there were other RMs that “shouldn’t be growing at all if we were doing business the right way.”

Division 2 Councillor John Saleski said he took exception to Greenwood’s statement, adding that he felt the RM was a “great place to do business” given how it surrounds the largest urban municipality in the province.

Noting that council frequently discusses how much the RM is growing, Saleski said, “If it was such a bad place to do business, then people wouldn’t be doing business here.”

Saleski brought up a piece of information that was presented at the December 9 meeting which informed his opinion on the tax exemption policy.

He said that in other municipalities, a building permit issued in October or November would result in the Saskatchewan Assessment Management Agency being informed right away, resulting in that development’s assessment likely going up. However, the RM of Corman Park would wait until 2026.

“So that company has at least 12 months…to construct their building and they’re not getting an increase in tax on that,” Saleski said.

To offer a tax exemption on top of waiting that year effectively meant that residents were subsidizing businesses, some of which are very large companies, Saleski indicated.

He noted that some of the files he had seen recently relating to the tax exemption were connected to Fortune 100 companies setting up in the municipality.

Reeve Joe Hargrave said he was in favour of a tax exemption regardless of the size of the company, adding, “Just because you may have a whole bunch of money, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t get any advantages.”

Hargrave pointed out that the larger corporations had lots of options about where they pursue development.

He said they have to look at continually growing the RM, and the only way to do that is to get more development occurring.

Division 3 Councillor Lyndon Haduik spoke in favour of tweaking the policy instead of rescinding it, which Greenwood and Hargrave also supported.

However, Division 5 Councillor Arthur Pruim said he didn’t want to throw administration back on this project when they had already presented a number of options for dealing with this policy, adding, “I’m not sure they could refine much more than what they did.”

Division 8 Councillor Wendy Trask said she didn’t believe that ending the tax exemption would harm the RM, adding that the municipality was already the “location of choice” given its proximity to Saskatoon.

She pointed out that the muncipality has been struggling for a number of years to come up with enough money for infrastructure improvements, and ending this tax exemption was one way to generate more revenue.

“We need money, and we are desperately grasping for where to get it from,” she said.

Division 6 Councillor Steven Balzer backed up Trask’s argument, stating, “We have proven that we are growing no matter what.

“And, we need to finance that growth, and we need to support that growth.”

He also pointed out that no one on council had a clear comprehensive idea of how to attract business, and while there was a need to have a plan for doing so, the way things currently are “is not working.”