As Alberta reviews BIA rules, smarter taxation is possible: McBryan
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.
