Saskatchewan farm leaders are vowing to force the province’s three political parties to deal with unfair farmland taxes.
None of the political parties are offering to remove education taxes from property taxes – a key demand of virtually all farm groups in the province.
“The playing field is not level in this area, said Leroy Larsen, president of Saskatchewan Wheat Pool.
“Property owners are paying a disproportionate share of the education costs in this province.”
Sask Pool is part of a coalition of agricultural groups demanding the education tax on farmland be eased. The group includes the Saskatchewan Stock Growers Association, the Western Canadian Wheat Growers Association, the National Farmers Union, the Saskatchewan Livestock Association and the Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities.
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The coalition has sent letters to the New Democratic Party, the Saskatchewan Party and the Liberal party proposing that education taxes on farmland be capped for 1999, then reduced by 15 percent per year for 10 years. By 2010, education tax on farmland would have dropped from $150 million to $30 million.
When the three political parties unveiled their platforms at the beginning of the election campaign, none highlighted the education tax issue. The only commitments any of the parties will make are vague.
The Saskatchewan Party, generally seen as the most rural-focused, is offering to stop adding a heavier tax burden on farm property.
“We will end provincial downloading,” said Reg Downs, the Saskatchewan Party’s chief of staff.
Over time, the party would try to increase the province’s proportion of education funding so that municipal taxpayers would pay less. The province used to pay 60 percent of education funding, but in recent years that has slid to 40 percent. Property taxes now make up 60 percent of education funding.
The Saskatchewan Party wants to take the provincial portion back up to 60 percent, but makes no firm commitments on when.
The Liberal party has a similar approach. It wants to stop provincial downloading on municipalities and gradually reverse the education tax load.
“That trend has to stop,” said Liberal MLA Harvey McLane. “It has to be reversed and the province has to go back to funding education the way it used to.”
Goals and promises
McLane said the goal is to entirely remove education taxes from property, but the Liberal party makes no commitment on when a Liberal government could achieve that.
The NDP government has long accepted that collecting education taxes based on property taxes is not fair to farmers, who tend to own much more land than other taxpayers.
And before the election the NDP often said it would also like to return the province to providing 60 percent of the education tax bill. But the party is being cautious.
“We haven’t made any commitment,” said NDP spokesperson Mark Stobbe.
“Our focus on education is on increasing the quality of education for all students rather than dealing with the taxation issue specifically.”
Any change to how education taxes are collected would have to be worked out by the Saskatchewan Assessment Management Agency, municipalities and school districts, he said.
The NDP is not promising to increase its portion of education funding.
All three parties are concentrating on other tax changes, such as cuts to income and small business taxes.
Farmers have long complained they pay more than other businesses, because of agriculture’s large land base.
