First full disclosure: I have a personal financial interest in properties impacted by Port Metro Vancouver's waterlot lease strategy. Second full disclosure: I have a deep-seated aversion to mega-bureaucracies that willfully, or unwittingly, crush struggling hard-working small business people.
For those who may have missed the story that has ignited my wrath, it centres on Port Metro Vancouver hiking waterlot lease rates along the Fraser River.
The amounts vary - but most are onerous and all seem based on a formula that is fundamentally unfair and wrong. The impact on small marina owners and businesses and floathome communities on the river is substantial - and in some cases, dire.
On Wednesday, we published a story reporting what impact the port's decision has on just two small marina owners in Queensborough.
Kent Carbis runs the Royal City Marina, a bright and well-kept marina on the Fraser. If you're driving down Dyke Road, you could miss it, except his freshly painted slate blue clubhouse catches your eye.
Carbis isn't a real-estate developer, he's not a guy who's looking to expand an empire, he's not someone who tries to get out of paying his fair share - he's someone who loves the river and just wants to be able to keep running his small business.
The port is hiking his rent by 300 per cent. He doesn't know how he's going to be able to keep operating. Even if he passed on all of the new costs to the folks who have boats moored on his docks, and even if they could afford those rates, he would probably have nothing left for insurance or upkeep.
He's not alone. The port appears to be treating small marina owners as squatters to be forced out.
The double-whammy of this is that many of these river dwellers have been ekeing out a living on the river for decades - they're now in their 60s, and even 80s - and were hoping they could keep living on the river until they took their final journey down the River Styx.
Contrast this with the way the port likes to be treated.
In 2004, the provincial government enacted the Ports Property Tax Act.
This act capped municipal taxes at the rate paid in 2004 so big industry doing business on waterways didn't have to worry about tax increases, which could have an impact on their ability to make money and grow.
The act was extended to 2007 and extended again to 2018. And then in February of last year, the province made the act permanent.
Yes, a permanent tax break ensuring no one would have to pay a higher rate of taxation than they did in 2004 - forever.
The province also compensates municipalities for taxes it loses in this cozy little deal - effectively greasing their palms so they would agree to give the port a pass on paying their fair share.
Robin Silvester, president and chief executive officer of Port Metro Vancouver, said at the time, "Port Metro Vancouver is very pleased with the provincial government's decision to permanently extend the B.C. Ports Property Tax Act. These changes are essential in supporting the competitiveness of Port Metro Vancouver and our industry stakeholders." No kidding they were pleased.
Now contrast that with how the small business owners are treated on the river. Not only don't they get a break on taxes - they get charged up to 300 per cent more as their rates are based on the value of land they don't even own.
Part of the port's rationale for raising lease rates is that the port bases the value of the waterlot lease on an acre of commercial land in the vicinity.
Now, this isn't land the marina operator owns, it could be anyone's property. This is like living next to a guy who has a mansion and pool, when you're living in a rundown bungalow next door, and being told that your property tax is going to be based on his land and home, not yours.
To add insult to injury when one of the marina owners told the person at the port they couldn't possibly pay the new lease rates without going bankrupt - the port employee said they should move.
Clever idea. Just pull up all of those docks and pilings and plumbing and wiring and cart it over to the Wal-Mart parking lot and create a dry-land marina. Or better yet, perhaps move it to the $1 million acre of land the port is comparing it to and plunk it down there - even though it's on someone else's property.
We're not sure what ivory tower beancounter at the port or in Ottawa came up with this formula - but it sure wasn't the same one who came up with the permanent tax break for big port businesses. These ideas must come from people who have more degrees than they have commonsense.
Oh, and full disclosure number three - I often wonder if there are teams of bureaucrats in an office far, far, away who have contests to see who can come up with the boldest plan to reward big business and shove it to the little guy. Of course the teams get extra marks for audacity and for using large amounts of taxpayer money.
For the story on Kent Carbis and the waterlot lease hikes, go to www. royalcityrecord.com.
Pat Tracy is editor of The Royal City Record and its sister paper, the Burnaby NOW.
