The Alberta government has come up with compromises aimed at helping the energy industry while reducing the pain inflicted on rural MD's and Counties.

Municipal Affairs Minister Tracy Allard says the government is trying to keep the oil industry viable without having huge tax increases foisted on rural ratepayers.

"There'll be no property taxes charged on new wells and pipelines for three years to kick-start investment for our energy industry here in Alberta," Allard says. "This provides effective incentive for future investment decisions for our industry partners at a time when we need it more than ever."

The government will also eliminate the Well Drilling Equipment Tax province wide for new drills.

She says this will create more jobs and tax revenue for municipalities in the long term by expanding their assessment base.

Additionally, the government will lower assessments for less productive oil and gas wells while continuing the recently introduced 35 per cent assessment reduction on shallow gas wells for three years.

Allard says the government has heard from rural municipalities who were looking at increasing to their ratepayers by as much as 200 per cent.

The head of the Rural Municipalities of Alberta, Al Kemmere says he appreciates the province has heard the concerns about huge tax increases on rural ratepayers.

"This is also going to be a challenge for my members, because you see the reduction in the values of assessed property that immediately plays onto the tax rolls of those municipalities," he says. "When we see a tax holiday for new drills, those incentives are great incentives to help industry and I credit them for that, but the challenge is those municipalities are going to be out those dollars."

He says they do support the changes to the tax rules which he called "much modified" from what had been proposed before.

READ MORE:

https://highriveronline.com/local/foothills-county-facing-shortfall-from-potential-provincial-cuts

https://highriveronline.com/local/ndp-calls-for-end-to-oil-and-gas-property-tax-breaks

 

Questions, comments or story ideas? e-mail news@okotoksonline.com