The final numbers are in and the final tax increase for Maple Ridge homeowners will be 3.5 per cent this year.
Council gave final reading to the financial plan bylaw at its May 12 meeting, three days before the May 15 deadline.
For an average home valued at $400,000, the increase means another $94 in municipal taxes and levies.
That’s based on a tax hike of just under three per cent for municipal purposes, which includes increases for parks, for general city purposes and for an infrastructure fund, in which money is stashed away to pay later for roads and sewer line repairs.
Increases to water and sewer utilities of five and four per cent, respectively, bring the overall jump for municipal purposes up to 3.5 per cent.
That means residents will pay $2,772 in municipal taxes, with regional charges such as that for TransLink added on to that.
That will push up the entire tax bill for that $400,000 home to $3,205.
Similar property tax increases are projected for Maple Ridge for the next four years. However, the new council, elected in November 2014, is currently updating its long-range plans and that could affect numbers in the city’s five-year plan.
A staff report notes that the plan has had to be tweaked since December because of a downfall in construction. That resulted in a one-per-cent increase in property tax revenue, half what was expected.
Budgets have been trimmed accordingly.
One of the major projects for this year is rebuilding Lougheed Highway from 224th to 227th streets, the final phase in the downtown improvement project.