Timmins has taken steps to appeal the assessed values of all the major local mining properties to the Ontario Assessment Review Board (ARB), on the grounds that mining property assessments are just too low. This is being done on a “just-in-case” basis since the city is already in negotiations with the three big mining companies in town to reach some sort of a deal outside of the MPAC (Municipal Property Assessment Corporation) assessment values and procedures.
Part of the reason is that in recent years MPAC has laid out new valuations for mining properties. In many cases means that MPAC is applying lower values to those properties. That means less tax money going into the city hall treasury.
MPAC has mentioned the term Economic Obsolescence (EO) in one of its studies relating to the gold mining industry to justify the need to provide lower valuations. “EO can be described as a form of depreciation or an incurable loss in value that occurs when influences external to an asset itself reduce the value of the asset,” said the study.
Following are the current assessment values MPAC has assigned for local mining operations for 2017, which amounts to more than $54-million:
-Glencore (Kidd) Met Site $7.9-million
-Glencore (Kidd) Mine Site $9.4-million
-Lake Shore Gold Timmins West $3.8-million
-Lake Shore Gold Bell Creek $10.1-million
-Gold Corp Dome Mine $15.6-million
-Gold Corp Hoyle Pond $7.8-million
In every case, Timmins city treasurer Jim Howie is on file at the Ontario assessment review office as seeking an appeal on the grounds that the “Assessment is too low”. All the appeals were filed on Tuesday.
This follows city council’s approval Monday night that gave Howie permission to take action, despite the fact he is already negotiating with the mining companies get a better deal.
“We’re entering into negotiations with memorandums of understanding and this is still in the works. To make sure we can put this forward we have to have an appeal in place before March 31st,” Howie told council. “We need council’s approval to appeal taxes, as per the Municipal Act,” he added.
For the rest of this article, click here: http://www.timminspress.com/2017/03/29/timmins-launches-assessment-appeals-against-local-mines