Carbonear hits bullseye on tax projections

By Craig Westcott / August 25, 2023

When it comes to projecting revenues for the year ahead, the finance people at Carbonear Town Hall are pretty good estimators.

The subject of taxes came up twice, briefly, during this week’s public meeting of council, but generated no special comment, probably because everything appears to be copacetic.

Finance committee chairman Chris O’Grady was the first to broach the subject.

“The taxes are still coming in,” the councillor noted in his regular report. “Property taxes are 87 per cent collected and the water and sewer (tax) is at 81 per cent, and the business tax is at 90 per cent collected. So, taxes are coming in. Unfortunately, we did have to disconnect the water to some properties, so some of those have come in and made arrangements to pay or have paid their accounts. We’re still working on some of those.”

Later in the meeting, chief administrative officer Cynthia Davis addressed the tax bills in her report to council.

Davis noted the Town had budgeted tax revenue this year of $5,564,012, and the amount levied to date is actually $5,565,608.

“We have exceeded what we budgeted by just over $1,500,” Davis said. “So, we’re in line with the budget for our revenue so far.”

On the expense side of the ledger – for the period as far as the end of June, all of the Town’s cost categories are under budget. 

“Our expenses are well within our budget and the revenue we had projected we have that levied as well,” Davis concluded.