Alberta is reviewing its regulations for business improvement areas, and a leader of one of these organizations said it's an opportunity to shift from taxing business owners to taxing property owners, potentially growing the pot for Edmonton's 13 BIAs.
"Right now, they're running this entirely parallel, separate tax system to levy businesses instead of what every other province (aside from Manitoba) does, which is just collect (the levy) as a line item across all property," Puneeta McBryan, the outgoing CEO of the Edmonton Downtown Business Association, told Taproot. "So what happens is, if you are a landlord that's overseas or in Toronto and you don't have a physical office in downtown Edmonton, you are paying zero dollars into the BIA."
Taproot confirmed the province is considering shifting to a property-based system in advance of some regulations expiring at the end of 2026. A spokesperson for Dan Williams, the minister responsible for municipal affairs, told Taproot that engagement with stakeholders included in-person and written submissions and concluded in August. The spokesperson added results will be shared with stakeholders later this year.
Taproot also obtained a copy of an engagement survey, which includes questions about levies and notes that one option Alberta's government is considering is to allow municipalities to decide which of the two kinds of levies to use.
Business improvement areas, usually called BIAs, are municipal entities that receive funds from all businesses (with some exemptions) via a levy that's collected by a municipality in a set area. In exchange, BIAs use the money to build economic vibrancy through events, beautification, or improve cleanliness and safety. BIAs can also steer municipal policy through advocacy. During her time at the EDBA, McBryan has been part of the Downtown Revitalization Coalition and offered routine input at city council. While city bylaws (which were updated in September) govern most of Edmonton's BIA activity, provincial policy outranks those bylaws for the levy model.
McBryan said the current levy system measures the wrong things to determine the levy. "(The city is) trying to levy businesses based on the (property) value of their premises. That has absolutely nothing to do with how profitable the business is, which makes it a very, very broken system," she said. "In many cases, (highly successful businesses) are paying very, very little because they happen to be in an old office building that isn't valued very highly."
The boundaries of the downtown BIA run along parts of 109 Street and 111 Street to the west, 105 Avenue to the north, 95 Street to the east, and across a diagonal section that includes Bellamy and Grierson hills to the south. McBryan said it totals 2.6 square kilometres and makes the EDBA the largest BIA in Canada by area. She also noted that, oddly, the area is larger than the Downtown Edmonton Community League's boundaries. At its current size and with a business-based levy, McBryan it's tough to serve its members.
"We already have an area that is way too big, and we're a tiny, tiny organization," she said. "Obviously, I believe the work that we do is invaluable, and really high impact and necessary, to create a vibrant downtown or a commercial district. You can't really do that well when you're trying to spread yourself over such a huge area."
Cities such as Vancouver and Toronto have a greater number of BIAs than Edmonton does, and they serve smaller geographic areas. Those cities also levy property owners rather than businesses.
Puneeta McBryan said levying property owners could offer BIAs with more spending power. Alberta's government is reviewing its various BIA regulations now, before some of them expire at the end of 2026. (Mack Male/Flickr)
McBryan said more BIAs serving smaller areas might work in Edmonton, but that smaller BIAs leveraged on businesses rather property can be ineffectual due to smaller budgets.
Small BIAs are already struggling in Edmonton, she added.
"Edmonton has 13 BIAs, and half of them are so small that I don't know that they feel they're able to make any difference at all," McBryan said. "We have at least four or five BIAs where they're just a one-person organization, just an executive director. And then in some cases, they are not even full-time, because there's just no money between all these small businesses."
The downtown business association has 1,224 members, though some are charities and government organizations that are exempt from paying a tax levy, McBryan said. She also said that the BIA's budget is $1.7 million in 2025, or roughly $1,400 per member.
To shrink or grow?
Recently, The BLOX, the BIA representing the Beltline in Calgary, expanded its boundaries and more than doubled its members, from 320 to 649. McBryan said the downtown BIA has explored expanding or contracting its boundaries, but nothing concrete has come from that work.
Last year, the EDBA considered a boundary extension westwards to 113 Street, but the BIA did not collect the 40 support signatures it wanted from business owners. "We could have taken it to council with our 20-ish signatures, but we really didn't want to go down this road unless we were really confident this is something that businesses in the area actually really wanted," McBryan said.
She said the EDBA also looked into reducing the BIA's eastern boundary from 97 Street to 95 Street, which would remove what the city calls The Quarters from the business association's purview. The new boundary would then align with DECL's boundaries.
McBryan said many Edmontonians know The Quarters as Chinatown South. What we call Chinatown today exists because Chinese-Canadians were pushed out of The Quarters to make way for the building of Canada Place in the 1970s.
She said she has had early discussions with the Chinatown and Area Business Association to put the area under the Chinatown BIA umbrella. (The Chinatown BIA's executive director, Wen Wang, declined to comment for this story, and board members did not respond to interview requests.)
"I don't think the Chinese community ever gave up on the area," McBryan said, about The Quarters. "When you walk around 97 Street, 95 Street and 96 Street, we still have such a rich Chinese community there, including a Chinese business community. There's (the Edmonton Chinese Seniors Lodge). There's some other non-profits. There's some of the best restaurants."
McBryan added that the downtown BIA has received calls from business owners in The Quarters requesting window washing service, which the BIA does not offer. The Chinatown BIA does, she said.
The new Harbin Gate is coming to Jasper Avenue and 97 Street, currently within the EDBA's boundaries, with construction slotted for early next year. The original gate was erected in 1987 in to commemorate Edmonton and Harbin, China, becoming sister cities. The gate was removed and dismantled in 2017 to make way for LRT construction.
The downtown BIA will soon have a new leader. James Robinson, who established a BIA in Toronto and worked at another in London, England, will become the executive director on Oct. 20. Robinson joins the EDBA from the City of Edmonton, where he recently served as business improvement areas infrastructure specialist.
Correction: This story has been changed to more accurately reflect the potential directions of expansion for the BIA.