Gregor Robertson still isn't clear on how a vacant home tax would be enforced

VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – Vancouver’s mayor is still hopeful the province will take charge of a vacant home tax, just as they did with the city’s foreign buyers tax.

Mayor Gregor Robertson says he doesn’t like the idea that the province would change the Vancouver Charter so the city can create and enforce a tax on homeowners who don’t live in or rent out their space.

“We’re hopeful that BC Assessment would actually administer this tax because that’s what they do for all the rest of our property taxes. This would be a new system which would put an extra load on the city of Vancouver,” he says.

In order for the city to do their own tax, Robertson says they’ll need a lot of data from the province including from the BC home owners grant, driver licenses, primary addresses, and rental income taxes.

But in the end, he still isn’t clear on how a vacant home tax would be enforced.

“It’s still early days in terms of enforcement and we need to make sure we have the data sets to do this,” he says.