Carly Stringer

The appellant brought a motion for disclosure of income and expense statements, rent rolls, and fair market rent analysis relied upon by MPAC for properties not under appeal.

MPAC agreed to produce the documents subject to third-party notice and confidentiality undertakings.

The Assessment Review Board granted the motion in part, ordering disclosure for the properties where the appellant successfully served notice on the third-party owners and tenants without objection, but denied disclosure for one property where notice was returned to sender.

MPAC brought a pre-hearing motion to strike portions of the Appellant's expert report and reply report on the basis that they raised new issues and included documents not served in accordance with the Board's Rules.

The Assessment Review Board noted that its Rules do not provide a mechanism to 'strike' evidence.

However, applying Rules 48 and 49, the Board held that the Appellant could not raise the new issues of vacancy allowance and non-recoverable expense allowance at the hearing because they were not set out in the Statement of Issues and no amendment was sought.

The Board also excluded the late-served operating expense documents from evidence, finding no exceptional circumstances to justify their admission.

The moving party sought an extension of time to bring property assessment appeals for the 2017 and 2018 taxation years, arguing there were palpable errors in the assessment roll.

The Municipal Property Assessment Corporation had erroneously classified the subject property as multi-residential development land rather than a single-family residential property, resulting in significantly higher taxes.

The Assessment Review Board found that these were palpable errors under section 40.1 of the Assessment Act.

Weighing the factors of correctness, timing, finality, and fairness, the Board exercised its discretion to extend the time for bringing the appeals, noting the significant financial hardship suffered by the moving party.

The moving party, a registered charity, brought a motion for an extension of time to appeal property assessments for the 2013 to 2021 taxation years.

The subject property, a single legal parcel of land, had been incorrectly assessed under five separate roll numbers since 1993.

The Assessment Review Board found that assigning multiple roll numbers to a single parcel of land constitutes a palpable error under section 40.1 of the Assessment Act.

Weighing the factors of correctness, timing, finality, and fairness, the Board exercised its discretion to extend the time for bringing the appeals, noting the significant financial prejudice to the moving party.

The appellants appealed the returned assessment of $3,514,000 for their residential property in Toronto for the 2021 and 2022 taxation years, seeking a reduction to $2,642,220.

The Municipal Property Assessment Corporation requested the assessment be confirmed.

The Assessment Review Board applied the direct comparison approach, analyzing five comparable sales to determine a current value of $3,958,689.41.

Applying an agreed-upon assessment to sale ratio of 0.93 to ensure equity with similar properties in the vicinity, the Board concluded the correct current value assessment was $3,680,000.

The Board ordered the returned assessment be increased to $3,680,000.

The moving party brought a motion for an order extending the time to bring assessment appeals for the 2019 to 2021 taxation years, arguing that an overstatement of the property's gross leasable area by over 30% constituted a palpable error in the assessment roll.

The Assessment Review Board found that while large measurement errors can be palpable, the error in this case was not of sufficient magnitude to be conspicuous, plain, and obvious.

As there was no palpable error, the statutory precondition for extending the time to appeal was not met, and the motion was denied.

The Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC) brought a motion to dismiss the appellant's property assessment appeals because the appellant failed to file a Statement of Issues by the deadline prescribed in the Schedule of Events.

The appellant missed the deadline by over five months and did not respond to MPAC's communications or its initial request to dismiss.

The Assessment Review Board found that the appellant's non-compliance was entirely of its own making and caused prejudice to MPAC.

The Board granted the motion and dismissed the appeals.

The City of Greater Sudbury appealed the current value assessments of several active mining properties owned by Vale Canada Limited and Glencore Canada Corporation for the 2017 to 2021 taxation years.

The City argued that the assessments by the Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC) were too low and sought significant increases.

The Board applied the cost approach to determine the current value, evaluating the reproduction cost new, depreciation, and land value.

The Board rejected the City's evidence, finding it unreliable and based on incorrect premises, and instead accepted MPAC's detailed and transparent costing and valuation methodology, which was supported by the property owners' experts.

The Board confirmed MPAC's current value assessments and found no equitable reduction was required.

The City of Niagara Falls brought a motion for disclosure in an assessment appeal concerning a property comprising a parking garage and a waterpark.

The City sought documents relating to revenue sharing, leases, parking activity logs, parking rates, and financial statements of the corporate group.

The Assessment Review Board applied the two-part test of relevance and proportionality.

The Board granted the requests for revenue sharing details, leases (narrowed to the subject property), activity logs, and parking rates, finding them relevant to the income approach to valuation and proportionate.

The request for the corporate group's financial statements was denied as overly broad and disproportionate.

The appellants in a property assessment appeal brought a motion under Rule 99 of the Assessment Review Board's Rules of Practice and Procedure to clarify a prior disclosure decision.

They requested an order declaring the previously ordered disclosure confidential under Rule 89 and requiring the respondents to sign non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) before receiving the documents.

The Board denied the motion, finding no misstatement or ambiguity in the prior decision.

The Board also held that the request for a confidentiality order was premature and that existing protections, including section 53 of the Assessment Act and the implied undertaking rule, were sufficient to protect the appellants' commercially sensitive information without the need for NDAs.

The appellant appealed the property assessment of his semi-detached residence, arguing that wood smoke from a neighbouring restaurant negatively impacted its value.

The Assessment Review Board found that the appellant failed to provide evidence connecting the air quality issues to a reduction in market value.

Relying on comparable sales provided by the Municipal Property Assessment Corporation, the Board confirmed the returned assessment of $673,000 and found no evidence to support an equitable reduction.

The appellant brought a motion to prevent MPAC from relying on late-filed expert documents and an amended Statement of Response.

MPAC conceded it would not rely on the amended Statement of Response or amended valuation report.

The sole issue was whether MPAC could rely on the late-filed acknowledgment of expert duty and CV of Jennifer Williston, and tender her as an expert witness.

The Board found that MPAC failed to provide evidence of exceptional circumstances to justify altering the Schedule of Events under Rules 40 and 48.

The motion was granted, and MPAC was not permitted to rely on Ms. Williston as an expert.

The Appellants appealed the returned assessments of $2,971,000 for their residential property for the 2020 and 2021 taxation years.

As a preliminary matter, the Board excluded the respondent's revised equity report because it was not served on the Appellants in accordance with the Rules of Practice and Procedure and no exceptional circumstances were shown.

On the merits, the Board determined the current value of the property as of January 1, 2016, using the direct comparison approach and comparable sales provided by the Appellants, finding the correct current value to be $2,558,762.73.

The Board then applied an equity adjustment based on the Appellants' Assessment to Sales Ratio analysis, reducing the assessment to $2,421,000 to make it equitable with similar lands in the vicinity.

The appellants appealed the property assessment of their single-family detached residence for the 2020 and 2021 taxation years, arguing the returned assessment of $2,501,000 was too high.

The Board excluded the respondent's updated equity report because it was not served in accordance with the Rules of Practice and Procedure.

Using the direct comparison approach and analyzing the parties' proposed comparable properties, the Board determined the current value of the property to be $2,385,438.21.

The Board then applied an equity adjustment based on the appellants' assessment to sales ratio evidence, reducing the final assessment to $2,228,000.

The appellants brought a motion requesting the Assessment Review Board clarify a previous disclosure order pursuant to Rule 99, declare the ordered disclosure confidential under Rule 89, and require the respondents to sign non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) prior to receiving the documents.

The Board dismissed the motion, finding no ambiguity in the previous decision that required clarification.

The request for a confidentiality order was deemed premature as no documents had yet been filed with the Board.

Finally, the Board declined to make disclosure conditional on NDAs, noting that existing protections under section 53 of the Assessment Act and the implied undertaking rule were sufficient to address the appellants' concerns regarding commercial sensitivity.

The appellants, car rental companies at Pearson Airport, brought a motion to separate their 2021 property assessment appeals from their 2017-2020 appeals.

They argued that the COVID-19 pandemic and related government restrictions altered the state and condition of the properties as of the December 15, 2020 state and condition date, creating a distinct issue for the 2021 taxation year.

The Assessment Review Board dismissed the motion, finding that the proceedings had not become unduly complicated, delayed, or repetitive, and that the appellants were not unduly prejudiced.

The Board also noted that any potential delay was attributable to the appellants' failure to bring the motion in a timely manner.

The appellant in a property assessment appeal brought a motion seeking leave for its paralegal representative to appear at the hearing as both an advocate and a witness.

The Municipal Property Assessment Corporation opposed the motion, arguing prejudice and lack of objectivity.

The Assessment Review Board granted the motion, finding that the representative intended to provide factual evidence rather than expert opinion evidence, and that any potential prejudice could be mitigated by the hearing member.

The Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC) brought a motion for issue estoppel regarding the current value assessment of the subject property for the 2020 and 2021 taxation years.

The appellants had previously appealed the 2019 taxation year assessment, resulting in a Board decision that determined the current value as of the January 1, 2016 valuation date.

The Board found that the three-part test for issue estoppel was met, as the same question had been decided, the previous decision was final, and the parties were the same.

The motion was granted, and the assessed value was set at $1,300,000 for the 2020 and 2021 taxation years.

The requestors sought a review of an Assessment Review Board decision that determined the current value of their property following 2019 alterations.

The Board had previously rejected MPAC's comparable sales evidence and instead used the requestors' evidence of the $47,000 cost of alterations to increase the assessment from $803,000 to $850,000.

On review, the requestors argued the Board erred by not resetting the effective year built to 1983, by not reverting to the previous assessment when MPAC failed to meet its burden of proof, and by using the cost approach without allowing rebuttal.

The Board dismissed the request for review, finding no violation of procedural fairness or significant error of law or fact.

The Board noted it has a statutory duty to determine current value based on the best evidence available and cannot simply revert to a previous assessment when MPAC fails to meet its burden.

The City of Vaughan brought a motion to exclude an affidavit filed by the appellant in reply during a written hearing before the Assessment Review Board.

Vaughan argued the affidavit was filed late and constituted improper case-splitting.

The Board dismissed the motion, finding that the affidavit merely cured a technical defect by swearing to unsworn documents previously filed on time.

The Board concluded there was no prejudice to Vaughan and granted Vaughan an opportunity to file amended responding submissions.