Municipality of The Nation, Ont. to increase taxes by 9.5 per cent

The Nation municipal building. (Dylan Dyson/CTV News Ottawa)

Residents of The Nation municipality east of Ottawa are being asked to bite the bullet come 2025 as their municipal taxes are set for a steep increase.

The municipality has approved a 9.5 per cent ax levy increase heading into the new year. That will cost the average homeowner an additional $345 on their tax bill.

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The Nation mayor Francis Briere says the municipality is now having to play catch up after years of not keeping up with inflation.

"In eight years, we raised the taxes by 12 per cent," he tells CTV News.

"I remember I was sitting on council as councillor, and we adopted a 0 per cent budget, and it was with the intentions always of keeping our taxes as low as possible. Looking back, that might not have been the wisest choice, because now we're at a point where Covid happened, and everything is exploded, as far as cost."

Residents in Limoges, like Sarena Thompson, are now concerned about where that money will come from.

"It is a huge chunk of change. Like, I'm already pulling overtime at my work," she says.

"I'm really frustrated, especially because I am a new homeowner and it's already so hard to afford everything with the mortgage rates and food. So having them increase it to such a large amount, it makes it even harder."

The municipality says, based on the average home assessment of $300,000, residents in Limoges will see their property taxes increase $222. Water and wastewater service will increase in cost by more than $120 next year. Sewer rates are also increasing $45.

At the bottom line, that adds up to the average resident paying more than $4,200 in municipal taxes in 2025.

"I'm on a small pension," says long-time Limoges resident Rachel Drouin.

"I don't have the money to pay that, especially if it's gone up 9 per cent. No, it's impossible. They can't do that."

Even before the increase, residents in the rural region did not feel they were getting their money's worth out of their community.

"I don't have any streetlights, no sidewalk, no nothing. And they keep putting it up. This is ridiculous," says Drouin.

"We recently had our bank closed down," adds Thompson.

"They shut down our school library temporarily, but they don't have an opening date for that yet. So, all we really have is a few pizza places and a corner store. We have nothing else here for us."

Briere says past budget increases may have been shortsighted. Now with projects to complete, like road repairs and arena renovations, he's asking for residents to chip in.

"We're going to bite the bullet this year, and going forward, we're going to be able to maintain the services and that we currently have."