City of Vancouver considers hiking fees to avoid tax increase

Several services and licenses in the City of Vancouver could soon get more expensive.

In a report published Wednesday, city staff recommended council vote to approve fee increases to a handful of services in an effort to avoid a huge spike in property taxes.

Licences that could see fee increases include those for businesses, short-term rentals, pets, cemeteries, and contractors. Price bumps in parking fees are also being considered.

Staff suggest increasing a standard business licence fee from $171 to $250, fees for trades and contractors from around $200 to $340, and short-term rental licence fees from $109 to $450. Those increases, staff say, would generate over $3.9 million in additional revenue for the city.

When it comes to parking, staff recommend bumping up residential parking permit fees from $65 annually to $131 per year. Staff are also recommending the expansion of metered on-street parking. The report says these two initiatives would generate an additional $5.5 million in revenue.

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Further sponsorship and naming opportunities for businesses, increases to ride-hailing service fees, and hikes in commercial vehicle decal fees are among the other areas staff are exploring.

Council directed staff earlier in the year to find alternative ways to generate revenue for the city that didn’t involve increasing property taxes.

Coun. Mike Klassen says that council has heard that residents prefer fee increases to property tax hikes.

“Cities have very few revenue tools and we want to try and keep property taxes as low as possible, especially when we’re seeing such high inflation. User fees are something, when surveyed, people liked more than general taxation,” he told CityNews on Thursday.

Klassen says the higher fees if approved, will put Vancouver in line with cities like Surrey.

“Traditionally, some of Vancouver’s fees have been quite a bit lower than other jurisdictions so I think that was some of the work of staff to look at that,” he said.

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In total, the fee increases are expected to raise $15.2 million in revenue, which would equate to an avoided 1.4 per cent property tax hike.

Vancouver’s 2023 budget includes a property tax increase of 10.7 per cent — something Mayor Ken Sim vowed to whittle down in the coming years.

Council will discuss the proposed fee increases at its Sept. 13 meeting.

With files from Srushti Gangdev