To help understand the municipal budget

As people are aware, some of the former cities "de-merged" while the rest were divided into boroughs. Some of them were former suburbs of Montreal while others were divisions of the former territory of the City of Montreal. The information which follows applies to the boroughs of Montreal.

The central administration sends only one tax account and collects all the sums paid by property owners. It defrays the expenses of the agglomeration (police force, firemen, public transport, “regional” infrastructures, etc) and returns an “assigned budget" to each borough to cover its local expenditures.

The municipal evaluation roll is used as a basis for calculating taxes; when a borough receives a transfer that is higher than the average amount of what other boroughs receive, this can cause an increase in the taxes of property owners. The Quebec Government has provided for the municipal evaluation, which came into effect in 2007, to be spread out over four years (instead of three), reaching its maximum in the year 2010. A new roll will then be filed which could also be spread out over several years. In 2008, the increase in the evaluation combined with the tax rate will result in an average increase of 3% in fiscal charges for all properties in Verdun Borough. Even within boroughs, there will also be variations in the evaluation roll based on the types of properties and sectors concerned. In L’Île-des-Soeurs, therefore, the property evaluation progressed less quickly than in other areas of Verdun during the last roll. This is why several residential buildings in the island will not be affected by the average 3% increase in fiscal charges.

Each borough can determine which funding sources it will use to fill the gap between what Montreal allocates and its own local budget. It can use its accumulated surplus (if available), impose a special tax, reduce expenses or impose special fees for certain services.

In Verdun, several options were chosen for 2008: the reduction of certain expenses, the imposition of a borough tax ($0.021 per $100 of evaluation), the appropriation of $475,000 to the accumulated surplus and an increase in fees for certain services.

Another element which affects the budget are the investment funds. This measure aims to support the increase of tax assets for the entire City of Montreal. It aims to support the development of large projects that can generate a rapid growth of tax revenues. As an example of how these investment funds are going to be used, the Borough cited the development project of the northern point of L’Île-des-Soeurs.

It is therefore the City of Montreal which decrees the applicable tax rate for the whole island and it also collects the taxes. The Borough, by relying on the allocation that it receives, will determine the tax measures to take to meet its local expenditure. When a borough tax is imposed (as will be the case in 2008), it will appear on the tax statement prepared by the City of Montreal. In 2007, Verdun withdrew from the surplus which it accumulated in the previous years in order to partially compensate for the insufficient amount allocated by the central administration.