I agree with Mr. Cooper on business taxes

Letter to the editor,

In response to Rob Cooper’s letter about high taxes.
I also am in the same position as Rob. You don’t want to just up and quit and lose all your lifelong investments but you just can’t afford the taxes.
When I lived in Rainy River, I sat in on countless meetings over the past number of years to discuss how to promote Rainy River and create new business development in Rainy River.
Our councilors can justify the taxes in many ways but the bottom line is very simple. How can we possibly interest potential business owners to choose Rainy River as the town to run their business in when our taxes are too high to make it feasible?
The attraction to Rainy River would be the small town lifestyle or interests pertaining to nature such as fishing or hunting.
Our small population makes it impossible to expect any large return on investments made. Any business in Rainy cannot expect more than a small profit so if taxes are eating up a significant portion of that profit it’s just not feasible to be in business in Rainy River.
The town is going to end up owning several businesses in lieu of property taxes paid and many honest hardworking people are going to end up losing their livelihood and any financial investment they’ve made in Rainy River. A pity when the town is supposed to be promoting a healthy business community not ending owning the very businesses that should have been supported. Konamen Lumber ended up that very same way. A business that was taxed to death, seized by the Town in lieu of unpaid property taxes and then sold for a fraction of its real value.
What is the solution to this problem? Are there government grants that the town can apply for to supplement costs rather than collecting it from people who can’t afford to pay the high amounts? Is everyone in town paying the taxes they are supposed to be paying? Perhaps commercial taxes can be lowered and residential taxes take up the slack.
It’s far better the property taxes are more evenly balanced rather than a select few pay a far larger portion.
I’ve lived in other communities that offered very low taxes to new and existing businesses to successfully promote and support their local businesses. As we’re all finding out, a community dies without a healthy business community. We’re not far from losing all.
We need some forward thinking people in a position to do something about this situation and to step up to the plate and find a solution to this huge problem before it’s too late.

–Monica Pigeon (Nelson),
Fort McMurray, AB.