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City of Revelstoke to look at heritage revitalization policies

Letter from owners of Explorer’s Society Hotel prompts council to ask for report on heritage options
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The City of Revelstoke will be taking a look at its heritage revitalization policies after the owners of the Explorer’s Society Hotel wrote council a letter requesting a tax freeze after they renovated the historic McKinnon Block downtown.

While council didn’t agree to their request, they did ask staff to look at ways to support heritage revitalization projects.

“We want to encourage this type of activity but I think council is really going to have look at both sides. What are the implications if we go down this path and do something about it?” asked Mayor Mark McKee during Tuesday’s council meeting.

Rebekah and Stephen Jenkins wrote to the city asking for their taxes to be frozen at the 2015/16 level for five years. They said the building cost $500,000 more to renovate than their worst-case scenario, and their property tax bill jumped to $20,000 from $12,000 as a result of their work. They also have to spend $13,000 a year to meet the city’s parking requirements.

“We fully restored an important downtown heritage building that now has another 100 years of life. Perhaps, our project is the largest heritage remodel in the history of Revelstoke,” they wrote. “It is common to buy older buildings and paint them, but not necessarily improve their infrastructure or services. A significant contributor could be property tax escalation. This inconsistency does not encourage revitalization of the downtown core and at some point will become an issue as the services and buildings age and decline. This is not in Revelstoke’s best interest. A proactive plan for ensuring the preservation of our beautiful heritage buildings is a must for a sustainable tourism future. We volunteer to be part of an initiative to make this happen.”

Their letter sparked a discussion at the council table about how to move forward. Councillor Linda Nixon introduced a motion for staff to prepare a report on options for moving forward. “There’s a whole area of our community that’s asking us to look at our heritage strategy,” she said.

Allan Chabot, the city’s Chief Administrative Officer, said the city could not provide any tax exemptions this year. “Any tax exemption would have to be done by October,” he said. “It would be exceptionally rare for a exemption to be granted after a renovation.”

McKee said the city would have to look at all sides if it wanted to provide a tax exemption. He noted there could be implications of granting one business a tax exemption and that others would ask for the same thing.

“Maybe we should be looking at a whole heritage revitalization plan for the downtown core for heritage buildings and coming up with some kind of overall plan to encourage more of this type of thing to be happening,” he said.

Coun. Connie Brothers agreed. “My concern is if we do these things on a one-time basis. I don’t think we should do it that way,” she said. “If we’re going to do this we should have an overall strategy so we know what the rules of the game are, and everybody knows what the rules of the game are.”

Coun. Scott Duke questioned burdening planning staff with creating the report. “For me, it’s not of the highest priority right now,” he said.

With staff dealing with a backlog of building permits, council didn’t give staff a timeframe to produce a report.

Last year, council granted Gareth Jones, the owner of the Mountain View school building, with a five year tax exemption to facilitate the restoration of that designated heritage building.

You can read the the Jenkins’ letter below:

Explorers Society hotel letter by AlexCooperRTR on Scribd