CALGARY — A proposed charge on water licences of 40 cents per acre-foot has angered Alberta irrigators who claim the fee is a tax grab.
The department of Alberta Environmental Protection has proposed a user fee for surface water withdrawals of over 1,000 acre-feet per year. Ground water users who take more than 100 acre-feet per year may also be charged this rate. (An acre-foot is a measurement of water and is the amount required to cover one acre to a one-foot depth.)
This charge is only being discussed for municipal, industrial and irrigation water licences, said Lewis Fahner, an environmental department spokesman. Later on, a charge may be levied for all water users no matter what the purpose, with the exception of those who use small amounts, he said.
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“The concept is user pay. The department operates and maintains about $3 billion worth of provincially owned water management systems, mostly in the southern part of the province. The concept is that there should be some small fee that will help provide toward the ongoing operation and maintenance of these,” said Fahner.
“At some point you have to take a look at having the users assume a little more of the responsibility rather than passing it on to taxpayers in general.”
This fee has been included in the department’s three-year business plan, which will be tabled along with the provincial budget on Feb. 24. If the proposal for the charge goes through, billing will not likely start until the 1994-95 fiscal year.
Irrigators in southern Alberta oppose the charge because they view it as a new tax, and because there is no accurate way to measure water use, said Stan Klassen. He is the manager of the Alberta Irrigation Projects Association, which represents 13 irrigation districts in the province where more than one million acres are irrigated.
“It clearly falls into the category of a tax and that flies clearly in the face of where this government comes from when he (premier Ralph Klein) said new taxes are old-fashioned. This is a new tax.
”This has nothing to do with the price of water. It has everything to do with tax. If it had anything to whatsoever do with pricing, it would be volume-related,” he said.
“This is a temporary measure to help Alberta Environmental Protection balance its internal budget. It’s simply seeking new revenues. What will happen when they find themselves short next year,” said Klassen, adding this increase could lead to others in future years.
