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Residential property taxes to jump 6.98% in Loyalist Township · North Shore News

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  residential property taxes are set to jump 6.98% in Loyalist Township with its 2025
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  budget on the way. The third and final meeting regarding the draft budget took place this
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  week with the final budget expected to be adopted on December 10. The increase in residential
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  property taxes comes from a $23.57 million levy requirement within the budget. Treasurer
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  and director of finance Shelly Steadall explains the increase.
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  The levy requirement is a $23.5 million, which is a $2.1 million increase over 2024.
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  And that increase in just the levy is a 9.9% increase. Now, when we apply the market value
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  assessment that's levied by MPAC, we come up with just a residential township tax rate that would be
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  re increasing year over year 6.98%. So 6.98% is the tax rate increase that would people would
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  actually pay on their tax bill or just the township portion of their taxes. That's how much it would
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  increase at the current proposed 2025 draft budget. The budget also includes funds for local
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  transportation services, including $1.4 million for Amherst View Transit and $7.9 million for the
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  Amherst Island Ferry. Capital projects will receive nearly $9.5 million to address infrastructure
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  needs. Staff noted they will be making an application to the Green Municipal Fund to fund
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  80% of a feasibility study estimated at $150,000. They will also be applying to the Township Community
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  Grant Program to fund the remaining 20%. Councillor Carol Parks spoke about the impact of the
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  township's physician recruitment program. In 2023, Council approved the establishment of the program
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  to try to recruit family physicians, which was for $100,000 per physician over five years.
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  Ideally, we had budgeted one additional physician every year, and that was to come out of operating
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  and initially $60,000 was applied for from the Community Grant Fund. We were fortunate, I would
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  say, in that we got three physicians in the first year, not just one. And so we have committed
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  through agreement to fund for three physicians who have taken over for retirements at the Loyalist
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  Family Health Team in Amherst View, which we're very fortunate that those patients did not lose
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  their family physician. That only leaves us 20,000 in the budget. So initially, if Council wanted
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  two additional physicians coming up, it would be an additional 40,000 on that. But staff made the
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  cut and so removed one of them. So right now the budget currently includes $20,000 for an additional
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  physician in 2025 to be able to pay for the recruitment of one more in 2025. So the $20,000
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  savings is for what's currently in the budget to be able to offer the physician recruitment
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  incentive program. Corporate communications manager Trevor Cornelius explains the importance of public
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  input. We've had those conversations with the finance team and the communications team. I think
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  going into next year, there's a broader range of tools that we can incorporate and use with this
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  platform, such as like participatory budgeting and having budget sliders so people can identify or
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  allocate preferences in terms of how they would like to see funds allocated. So I think there's
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  more opportunities to have resident impact on those results because yet it is easy to say
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  you don't want the taxes affected, but sometimes there's choices that have to be made
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  and it'd be nice to involve residents in that process as well.
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  Councilor Paul Proderick spoke about wanting to see more public input in the future.
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  The results are tilted in one direction, obviously. So nobody wants the taxes to go up,
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  obviously, but give them that section to say, well, what would you cut? Because I think that's
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  the central issue here is nobody wants their taxes to go up and it's easy to say, right? But
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  what are the alternatives for the general public? And that's something I'd like to see down the road.
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  For Amherst Island Radio and the Local Journalism Initiative, I'm Ted Evans. This is North Shore News.