Starland County is sponsoring a resolution to be presented at the meeting of Rural Municipalities of Alberta to lobby for municipal recourse for solvent energy companies choosing not to pay taxes.
With the downturn in the economy, Starland County has been hit hard by companies that have not paid their municipal taxes, and Starland had no recourse. The county is hoping Rural Municipalities of Alberta will make it an area to lobby for changes.
It resolves “that the Rural Municipalities of Alberta lobby the Government of Alberta to direct the Alberta Energy Regulator to add unpaid municipal taxes to the grounds for which a company may be denied a licence to operate in the province of Alberta.”
Its proposal states that under the Municipal Government Act if a landowner refuses to pay taxes, there are several remedies for a municipality to recover those taxes, with the ultimate being the seizure and sale of the property. It has no recourse when dealing with the energy industry as it is the Alberta Energy Regulator that has the ability to licence energy companies to operate.
Under the directive of the AER, it can consider many factors when licensing a company to operate or to revoke that licence. Paying taxes is not one of them.
“While it almost certainly implies in this section that not paying debts, such as property taxes, are grounds for the termination of licenses, it does not say so explicitly,” states the resolution.
“We now have a situation where companies are using the lack of a specific threat to either seize their property or shut them down to extort municipalities into favourable tax treatment over their fellow businesses operating in the community. It is important to remember this resolution is referring to solvent companies. It would be difficult to imagine this situation if the threat were directed at federal and provincial business taxes or royalties.”
Reeve Steve Wannstrom says the resolution has already passed at the Zone level. This means it will be presented at the November convention of the Rural Municipalities of Alberta. If the resolution is accepted by the membership it shall be active for three years as a lobbying priority for the association.
