Swift Current Chamber of Commerce Addresses Recent Report Released by CFIB
(WANTED: Property Tax Fairness in Saskatchewan Cities)

SWIFT CURRENT, November 23, 2011/ CHAMBERNewswire/ -- The Swift Current and District Chamber of Commerce would like to address the recent report released by the CFIB titled, WANTED: Property Tax Fairness in Saskatchewan Cities. In the time since the report was released, the Chamber has consulted the City of Swift Current, member businesses and other Chambers from across the Province so as to qualify the information in the report, understand the stance of our membership and prepare a position for the Chamber based on this feedback.

The item that is most prominent in this report is the fact that Swift Current’s property taxes are among the lowest in the Province. On the residential side of the tax base, Swift Current is by far the lowest in the Province and on the commercial side of the tax base, Swift Current is third lowest, behind only Saskatoon and Martensville. (It should be noted that this study was absent of the assessment values, which vary widely from city to city but would have resulted in a more accurate comparison of levies).

The Chamber of Commerce does applaud the City of Swift Current for being able to achieve the status of having the lowest property taxes in the Province, which is just one of many attributes Swift Current boasts when attracting new residents and new business. This is something that we as a municipality, our business community as well as our residents should all be very proud of.

However, the item of discussion from the CFIB report is the gap between commercial and residential property taxes and the fact that Swift Current boasts the widest gap of all municipalities in the Province. Where the Chamber of Commerce is here to advocate on behalf of our membership, the business community, we would ultimately like to see the gap between commercial and residential taxes disappear but, at a minimum, we would like to see it decreased. We do appreciate that the City is mandated by the province to levy commercial properties based on 100% of assessed value and residential on only 70% assessed value.

Having said that, we as a Chamber recognize that the tax burden has to be placed somewhere so if the gap is decreased simply by shuffling the tax burden from commercial to residential then business owners, their employees and their customers will bear that burden on their homes.

We as a Chamber, on behalf of our membership are advocating that the City, in the coming years, work toward decreasing the gap between commercial and residential taxes and more fairly distribute the tax burden between the two groups. More importantly, we feel that this can be achieved, not by diverting existing tax burdens from the commercial tax base to the residential tax base but rather, by implementing strategies focused on increasing the size of the current commercial tax base and allowing that gap to decrease based on existing formulas.

One such example is the prospective annexation of the commercial strip in the RM of Swift Current west of the City, which would see an immediate addition of commercial tax base and no addition of residential, thereby lessening the gap between commercial and residential. Another contributing factor to lessening the gap will be existing businesses that are currently taking advantage of the property tax incentive program. Once the five year tax holiday comes to an end for those businesses, they will be contributing at full assessed value.

Ultimately, the best strategy to lessen the gap, and one that we encourage the City to continue to work toward, is business growth. By continuing to grow the commercial tax base, we lessen the burden for each individual business and thus, decrease the gap.

In conclusion, the Chamber is advocating that the City work to decrease the gap between commercial and residential, not by redistributing the current tax burden but rather, building the commercial tax base with creative and dynamic economic growth strategies and business development plans.


Questions or Comments?
Please Contact:

Trevor Koot
Chair, S.C.C.C. (Chamber of Commerce)
Cell: 306.774.4113
tkoot@306invest.com

For your information and feedback we have included the link to the Integrated Facility Concept Public Survey. Please feel free to forward this information to friends, family and colleagues.

Public Survey


The Cypress Health Region has engaged in functional planning to replace its three existing Long-Term Care facilities in Swift Current, and plans to relocate these services into an addition of the Cypress Regional Hospital, located on Saskatchewan Drive in the city's northeast end.

The Holy Trinity Catholic School Division has recently decided to build a new Pre-Kindergarten to Grade 8 School close to the Christ the Redeemer Parish Church, also in the city's northeast end. Holy Trinity's new school will accommodate up to 500 students.

The Chinook School Division has received initial approval from the Ministry of Education to build a Pre-Kindergarten to Grade 8 School, subject to the closure of Ecole Oman School. It is recommended by the Ministry that this new school be jointly developed with Holy Trinity, and be built to accommodate up to 500 students.

Please note that the Ministry of Education requires 10.5 acres of land for any school housing 450 to 500 students. If Holy Trinity and Chinook were to build a joint school they would require 21 acres of land in order to house 900 to 1000 students.

The City of Swift Current also has an interest in upgrading its facilities in a number of areas. Depending on feedback from stakeholders this may include: A pool/aquatics centre, field house and soccer facility, museum, art gallery, library, etc. Several or all of these may be achieved by working collaboratively with the School Divisions and the Health Region.

This Integrated Facility Concept would allow all partners - Cypress Health Region, Holy Trinity Catholic School Division, Chinook School Division, and the City of Swift Current - to build better, larger, and more efficient facilities by sharing costs.

Earlier this week the Canadian Chamber partnered with Google Canada to launch an exciting initiative aimed at getting all Canadian businesses to have their own website.

The company announced its Canada Get Your Business Online initiative, www.gybo.ca, on Tuesday at a launch event in Toronto where the chamber network was ably represented by Richard Cunningham of the Markham Board of Trade. The French website occurs this evening in Montreal; that address is www.ecsel.ca.

Google is hoping to give out websites and domain to at least 100,000 small and medium sized Canadian businesses. All costs associated with setting up the site and obtaining the domain name will be paid by Google.

The Swift Current & District Chamber of Commerce is please to become an official supporter of this initiative and looks forward to spreading the word amongst the business community. I encourage others to launch this program and to become a supporter. If you become an official supporter, you’ll get marketing materials to make it easy to spread the word, as well as tool … like a link on the gybo.ca website and a free $200 AdWords credit. Please assist in spreading the word to small and medium size businesses in your community.

SWIFT CURRENT, October 27, 2009/ CHAMBERNewswire/ -- The Swift Current & District Chamber of Commerce (S.C.C.C.) has received many requests regarding marketing of community events from businesses and organizations wishing to utilize the older version ‘fax outs’. Your Chamber is pleased to announce that commencing Wednesday, October 28, 2009, members will be able to take advantage of the new weekly email marketing program.

The ‘connect’ program offers a way to increase your exposure to the Southwest business community and to provide you with a marketing tool to succeed in the ever-changing world of business. More facets of ‘connect’ will be launched in the coming months.

For additional information, pricing, or to book your distribution day, please contact the Chamber office 773.7268.

SWIFT CURRENT, August 31, 2009/ CHAMBERNewswire/ -- The Swift Current & District Chamber of Commerce (S.C.C.C.) today announced the relocation of offices for operations to the newly established ‘Swift Current Business Centre’ (S.C.B.C.), located at Suite 8, 145 1st Avenue N.E., Swift Current, SK S9H 2B1.

‘As Swift Current and the Southwest continues to grow, the Board of Directors embraced the opportunity to maximize our potential by locating operations within the heart of the business community. This new location allows the Chamber to connect business opportunities and interests with membership and to better provide services’ says Jason Regier, Chair of the Board.

The Swift Current & District Chamber of Commerce looks forward to assisting you with your community needs and welcomes all visits to our new location.

On Thursday, September 24, 2009 your Chamber of Commerce and the business organizations located in the Centre invite our community to participate in the Grand Opening/Open House between the hours of 2:00 pm and 4:00 pm. We look forward to seeing you there.