Tax abatement is working in many communities to help promote development and expansion of local businesses.
However the City of Humboldt only has tax exemptions for renovations for downtown businesses.
The Chamber of Commerce held a Member Relation Meeting on Feb. 23 to encourage discussion on the policy and whether businesses wanted to see more abatements for expanding local businesses.
Chamber Directors Adam Tremblay and Jeff Saufert and Chamber President Kim Mitchell were present to moderate the very little discussion that took place with only one person showing up who was not a council member or with the chamber.
Tremblay says they wanted to hold the meeting to see how members felt about the current abatement and to see what more can be done to help local businesses expand.
“There has been a few people in town who have approached the city for having a tax abatement which we don’t have. We just wanted to get feedback from the business community and see what their opinion is.”
One business owner came to the Chamber after not receiving a satisfactory response from the city about not having an abatement program in place.
“That’s not to say the City is not doing something, just sometimes policy takes time,” says Mitchell.
The current policy provides tax exemption to downtown businesses, “permitted in the C1 – Commercial Core district” according to the policy, as a way to help with main street revitalization. Depending on how much the businesses are investing in their renovation costs, they can receive 100 per cent exemption from property taxes for one to five years.
Currently there are only 100 businesses within Humboldt that are eligible under that policy. Another 313 businesses reside outside that downtown core, including commercial, industrial and home-based businesses.
If this is an issue with multiple businesses, Tremblay says they want to hear from local business owners to see whether this is something they should be taking to the City as representatives of the business community.
“We want to make sure that we have the right feel of every member of the Chamber of Commerce so we can represent them accordingly,” says Tremblay.
The City of Humboldt saw a decrease in construction for 2016 with 57 permits issued but only $4.88 million worth of development compared to 2015 that had $15.8 million worth of development.
Some city councillors did attend the meeting but only to observe the discussion and see what businesses owners were expecting of a new policy.
The fact that turn out was very poor could be a sign that the city’s policy on tax exemption is not an issue for local businesses but Tremblay says they were hoping to have feedback both positive and negative feedback.
“We were definitely hoping for a better turn out than what we’ve had.”
Mitchell says the Chamber is interested in the growth and sustainability of local businesses.
