Saskatchewan’s general farm organization wants the province to come up
with $65 million to restore agricultural funding to where it was two
years ago.
Terry Hildebrandt, president of the Agricultural Producers Association
of Saskatchewan, said the province should reinstate the education tax
rebate and a full crop insurance program. Both were cut in the March
budget.
It should also compensate farmers for the 12.8 percent increase in
property taxes due to changes in assessment since 2000.
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Hildebrandt said the premier has noted the provincial gross domestic
product is down because of the weakened agricultural sector.
“You don’t pull support at this time,” he told a May 7 news conference.
“It’s just poor, poor public policy.”
Removing spot loss hail and the variable rate option resulted in a $20
million cut in crop insurance funding, he said.
The education tax rebate, a two-year program that expired at the end of
2001, was worth $25 million a year, and Hildebrandt estimated the
assessment changes cost farmers another $20 million.
He said coming up with $65 million this year would simply take farmers
back to the status quo.
APAS wants the education tax rebate in place until the province
develops a more equitable way of funding education.
Saskatchewan raises 60 percent of its education funding from land
taxes, compared to Manitoba at 28 percent.
Hildebrandt said the average farmer pays about $4,100 in education tax,
or four times more than the “representative” Regina homeowner.
“We have producers paying $15,000 of education tax and their children
having to ride 55 miles to school,” he said.
The changes announced in the March budget mean a producer with 5,000
acres is paying about $20,000 a year more. On the average farm of about
1,200 acres, a producer is paying $4,000 more, Hildebrandt said.
The APAS president said resentment is building in rural areas.
“Enough is enough,” he said. “Don’t pull from the agriculture sector
hoping that they’ll grumble a little bit and then go seeding and it
will all be forgotten.”
Agriculture minister Clay Serby ruled out changes to crop insurance
this year. He agreed the issue of property tax needs to be addressed,
but said he won’t reinstate the $25 million rebate because that money
has gone to other programs, including municipal revenue sharing.
“We need to start to examine what model we should be using to fund
education,” he said. “Clearly there is a disparity in the amount being
paid and collected for the various different sectors.”
But he noted all sectors think they are paying too much, not just
farmers.
Saskatchewan collects $600 million in property tax to fund education.
He asked how that amount could be raised differently.
“What APAS doesn’t answer is the question about who should pay,” Serby
said. “That will be the fundamental discussion.”
Hildebrandt said the minister has told farm groups that the province
would come up with emergency aid if it had to, so there must be money
available somewhere in the budget to make the immediate changes APAS
requested.
Serby said he would have to request money from the fiscal stabilization
fund, which was already drawn down significantly this year.
“Spot loss hail is hardly an emergency,” he said.
He also chastised Hildebrandt for holding a Regina news conference to
“beat up on” the province while other farm groups were in Ottawa making
a case for their farmers.
