(File photo/northeastNOW staff)

By Ben Tompkins

Town Council

Condo taxes, animal bylaws, RCMP training, topics of discussion at Nipawin Council meeting

Jul 13, 2022 | 8:48 AM

On Monday night, Nipawin Town Council held its regular meeting to discuss topics affecting their community and the people within.

Among the matters brought up, were complaints about high condominium taxes, dog attacks and animal bylaws, and RCMP training programs.

Condo Taxes

Residents and owners at Central Park Estates (CPE) have complained to the Town Office after the taxes on their properties have skyrocketed since their 2018 assessment.

According to them, their properties were assessed 60-67 per cent higher by the Saskatchewan Assessment Management Agency (SAMA) in 2021 compared to 2018.

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While the final assessments are slightly lower now, than they were last year, they say the huge increase is still unfathomable.

There is confusion as to why this is the case when the condo is four years older with no improvements having been done.

CPE also believes its footprint is no more than three of the large houses across the street from them, where there are large back yards and double car garages, as they question how much property taxes for houses have increased, which they were led to believe went down by 7 per cent.

SAMA used replacement cost instead of comparable sales in their assessment model.

Nipawin Mayor Rennie Harper told northeastNOW, “a decision on the matter will come forward once administration has a chance to review the complaint for a longer period of time.”

Dog Attacks

Over the past 8 months, the Town of Nipawin has received four complaints of aggressive dogs running loose, from the same residence.

In the first two incidents, which occurred during the winter, dogs one and two were running at large and confronting people on their property, by barking, growling and acting in an aggressive manner by challenging.

Tickets were served to the dog owner and two formal aggressive dog warning letters were served. The letters outlined that should future incidents occur, the Town may seek to have the dogs declared ‘dangerous animals’ pursuant to the Municipalities Act, before the Provincial Courts.

Since then, two further incidents occurred when three dogs chased a cyclist for several blocks. The cyclist managed to fend the dogs off, however, the larger dogs did mouth the cyclist’s legs, but were unable to grab ahold of the cyclist.

The second was the dogs running after a pedestrian and biting the victim on the right hamstring, resulting in a small tear on the jeans and a superficial bite. The victim attended the hospital and received a tetanus shot.

The Bylaw Officer is coordinating with RCMP and they are reviewing the possibility of criminal negligence, due to the long history with the dog owner and pets she has owned in the past and currently owns.

Mayor Harper provided the same response when asked about the situation.

RCMP Training Programs

An RCMP report was also discussed at council where it was revealed that crime stats are trending in the right direction, however, despite that, they are still looking for new members and assistance from the public.

“There are going to be some forms released, that people can sign up for the training for the cops’ program,” said Harper. “There is going to be a kind of collaborative effort to look at this cops’ program overall. Our numbers in the town as far as crime are down, but a reminder to have people remember, that if they see something that they think is strange, to phone the RCMP.”

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Ben.Tompkins@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter @BenTompkins_8