City Hall cannot say housing is unaffordable while ignoring the costs it adds to housing.
Your Tax Bill Is a Housing Affordability Issue
Housing affordability is usually talked about as if it is caused by forces far away from City Hall.
We hear about interest rates. We hear about land prices. We hear about construction costs, labour shortages, population growth, and senior levels of government.
All of those things matter.
But there is another cost of housing that is much closer to home: your municipal tax bill.
Every year, City Council approves property taxes and user fees. Those costs do not disappear into some abstract government spreadsheet. They land directly on households. They affect homeowners, renters, landlords, small businesses, builders, and anyone trying to stay in Nanaimo.
Property taxes are part of the cost of owning a home. Water, sewer, and garbage fees are part of the cost of living in a home. For renters, those costs are part of the cost of operating rental housing. For new housing, municipal fees, permitting costs, development charges, and delays become part of the final price.
So when City Hall says it cares about housing affordability, taxpayers should ask a very simple question:
Is the City making housing more affordable, or is it adding to the cost?
In Nanaimo, municipal tax and fee increases have not been small. Over the last number of years, property taxes, water fees, sewer fees, and sanitation fees have all climbed significantly. These increases have compounded year after year. A 6% or 7% increase may be described as manageable in one budget year, but repeated over time it becomes a serious burden.
That burden is felt by seniors on fixed incomes. It is felt by young families trying to buy their first home. It is felt by renters whose landlords face rising operating costs. It is felt by small businesses already dealing with wages, leases, insurance, utilities, and debt. It is felt by working people who are told the increase is “only” a few more dollars per month — as though every other bill has not gone up too.
City Hall often explains these increases by pointing to infrastructure, staffing, policing, service demands, and inflation. Some of those pressures are real. Roads, pipes, parks, public safety, and basic services have to be paid for.
But that cannot be the end of the conversation.
The real question is not whether every spending item can be justified. Almost anything can be justified if looked at in isolation. The real question is whether the total burden remains affordable to the taxpayer.
That is the test Council should be applying before approving yet another increase above CPI.
And if that test exists, taxpayers deserve to see it.
Before raising taxes again, Council should be able to answer plainly:
How much of the increase is caused by wages and benefits?
How much is caused by policing costs?
How much is caused by new staffing or expanded services?
How much is for maintaining existing infrastructure, and how much is for new spending?
Has Council compared the increase to CPI?
Has Council compared it to actual household income growth?
Has Council considered seniors, renters, working families, and people on fixed incomes?
Has Council asked staff to present a lower-cost alternative?
And most importantly:
At what point does Council say no?
That is the missing line.
Taxpayers are constantly told why the City needs more. But they are rarely told what standard Council uses to decide what residents can afford.
That matters because municipal government is not a passive observer in the affordability crisis. It is one of the actors adding costs to housing.
When property taxes go up, housing costs go up.
When water, sewer, and garbage fees go up, housing costs go up.
When development costs rise, new housing costs more.
When permitting is slow or complicated, financing costs rise and projects become more expensive.
When wage and benefit costs are built into the budget first, and taxpayers are asked to pay afterward, affordability becomes an afterthought.
This is not an argument against City workers. It is not an argument against infrastructure. It is not an argument against public safety.
It is an argument for accountability.
City staff prepare the budget. Council approves it. Taxpayers pay it.
That means Council has a duty to look beyond whether spending is desirable and ask whether it is affordable. Not affordable to City Hall. Affordable to the people who receive the bill.
If Nanaimo is serious about housing affordability, then municipal taxes and fees must be part of that discussion. Council cannot speak about affordability on Monday and approve above-CPI cost increases on Tuesday as if the two things are unrelated.
They are related.
For many households, the tax bill is not just a line item. It is groceries. It is rent. It is a mortgage payment. It is insurance. It is gas. It is childcare. It is whether a senior can stay in the home they worked their whole life to pay for.
That is why taxpayers need to pay attention — not just at budget time, but at election time.
Candidates should be asked where they stand on taxpayer affordability. They should be asked whether they support a formal affordability test before tax increases are approved. They should be asked whether they will require CPI-capped budget options. They should be asked whether they believe City Hall should live within the same financial reality as the residents who fund it.
Because affordability is not only about housing supply.
It is also about the cost of government.
And in Nanaimo, that cost is showing up on the doorstep of every taxpayer.
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