Paul J. Henderson, Black Press
A handful of commercial property owners in Popkum shocked by assessed land value increases of as much as 900 per cent may see some reprieve.
(Original story here: “Businesses stunned by assessment jump“)
The owners of Argyle’s Garden Market couldn’t believe it when they were told by BC Assessment their property went from a value of $417,000 last year to $1.398 million this year. The land was said to have increased in value from $241,000 to $1.23 million.
Some of the neighbouring commercial properties at the intersection of Yale Road and Highway 9 shot up even more. The Petro-Canada property increased 947 per cent from $364,100 to $3.8 million.
But after the Times reported on the assessments that seemed out of step with elsewhere in Popkum, and after the Argyles visited the BC Assessment office in Abbotsford on Tuesday they were pleasantly surprised by the response.
“I was impressed with the professional way they dealt with this,” Nigel Argyle said Tuesday, adding that the head assessor was shocked when he saw the numbers presented on page one of the Jan. 14 edition of the Chilliwack Times.
The assessors and the Argyles then signed a “recommendation to decrease land value” document to change their 2016 assessment from $1.398 million to $751,000.
The original jump in assessed values might have meant closing down the business, the Argyles said, because of the subsequent property tax increase it would have meant for their business that runs on slender margins.
“These people were very understanding and professional,” Joan Argyle said of the BC Assessment office.
