No cabin tax for Lab. West

Cabin owners in Labrador West can breathe easy.

The issue of imposing a cabin tax was raised in Happy Valley-Goose Bay again recently - the town wants cabin owners to pay property tax if they are within the town boundaries - but MNL president and Lab. City mayor Graham Letto said it has no implications for local cabin owners.

"We had a resolution from Happy Valley-Goose Bay last year at the (Municipalities Newfoundland and Labrador) convention, which wasn't passed (regarding the cabin tax), but really we have no authority to move forward on the issue because our membership turned it down; but it's been brought up again," he stated. "What's happening is some municipalities have cabins within their town boundaries - Happy Valley-Goose Bay does, for instance - and over the years the cabins have turned into quite elaborate homes."

He noted the town boundaries in Goose Bay cover a fair amount of space - they stretch halfway to Gull Island - but the town council hasn't been taxing the properties on the Trans Labrador Highway even though it's permitted to do so.

Mr. Letto admitted the cabin owners in Happy Valley-Goose Bay don't have water and sewer hookups to their cabins, but they do avail of other town services.

"They do expect the fire truck to show up if there's a fire, they expect their garbage to be picked up, and if they don't, they use the town facilities to dispose of their garbage and use the town facilities for their infrastructure needs, yet they are paying no taxes," he explained. "We don't have any in our area that meet that criteria. All the cabins people have in our area are outside our boundaries. We're talking about cabins that reside within municipal boundaries."

The MNL president said Goose Bay would have to get the properties in question assessed if it wants to move forward with the cabin tax and the amount of taxes paid will depend on the value of the property.

The Town will also have to be prepared to offer water and sewer services to the cabin owners within the boundaries or offer some kind of compensation for not having them if the cabin tax becomes a reality, Mr. Letto explained.

Municipalities Newfoundland and Labrador, he said, doesn't have any involvement with the process and the only reason it was brought to the membership was because Goose Bay wanted the provincial group to lobby for a different mil rate for cabins.

"The law doesn't allow for that," Mr. Letto stated. "You can only have one mil rate for residential and one for commercial, but the assessed value should take care of the difference in taxes that they want to charge. A structure on the highway may not be taxed as high as a house in town."

The mayor said there are a lot of municipalities in the province who have the cabins within town boundaries, but any decision made in those communities won't affect Labrador West unless someone builds a cabin within the town boundaries.

He conceded the cabins in the Albert Lake and Duley Lake areas do fall within Wabush and Labrador City municipal planning areas respectively, but right now there are no plans to extend the boundaries beyond where they are today.