LIIDLII KUE/FORT SIMPSON - Owed nearly $600,000 in overdue property taxes and with budgets tightening, the Village of Fort Simpson is getting serious about recovering what it is due.

"We are being a little more aggressive this year," said John Ivey, senior administrative officer.

The village sent out notices to those in arrears earlier this year and a list of those owing was also posted in various public locations around the municipality. Ivey said the village is following the steps laid out in the territorial government's Property Assessment and Tax Act and he is hopeful those owing taxes will negotiate a payment plan.

However, if residents still haven't made arrangements to pay by Dec. 31, 2011, the village has the legal right to seize and auction off properties in arrears.

"We don't want to seize properties," he said. "If we have receivables, like unpaid taxes, we have to try to collect them. It's not fair to the people who do pay their taxes. Some people get behind and the village has never really taken an aggressive stance with the judicial sale of properties."

As of Dec. 31, 2010, 74 residents, businesses and organizations owed the village roughly $595,000 in back taxes, including nine residents who individually owed more than $20,000 each.

According to Ivey, the village has collected nearly $35,000 since sending out the notices.

The Village of Fort Simpson operates an annual budget of more than $4 million, with tax revenues of approximately $1.6 million.

While noting the municipality attempts to recover unpaid property taxes every year, Ivey emphasized any recovered money would go towards paying for services.

"Costs are going up," he said. "We are not in dire straits here, but our revenues have been reduced and they are continuing to be reduced."

The village had its base-funding cut by the Department of Municipal and Community Affairs in 2010 and frozen at that same level for 2011, said Ivey.

Major sewage treatment plant work is required to respond to a Fisheries and Oceans clean-up order dealing with the toxicity levels of the effluent being discharged into the Mackenzie River. Also, the village is negotiating a new collective agreement for its roughly 20 employees, meaning workers' wages will be increasing, retroactive to Dec. 31, 2010.

Mayor Sean Whelly said there is no desire to raise utility rates or taxes, but the village has added costs to bear and the recouped tax dollars would help.

He said many residents in arrears find themselves in difficult economic situations and some are seniors on fixed incomes.

Council has been in discussions to possibly lower the interest rates on overdue accounts, but Whelly said no decision has been made. Doing this, he said, would allow those in arrears to pay more off of their principal owing, instead of just paying snowballing interest.

While Whelly admitted property sales and evictions were a last resort, he said residents who can't pay their back taxes should seek social assistance, as the village is unable to forgive unpaid taxes.

"There is always a possibility the housing corporation could purchase the house and then rent it to them," he said. "Then the only thing that would transfer would be the proprietorship."

Not all cases are black and white, though.

Six or seven properties listed on the village's public notice have been the subject of various land tenure claim disputes.

Jonas Antoine wrote, in an open letter to the village of Fort Simpson dated April 15, that there is no existing documentation to show that his lot is municipal land and, therefore, subject to taxation.

See Deh Cho Drum next week for the second part of this series on the complex issue of land tenure claims in the village.

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