OARB 2022

The Applicant applied to the City of Toronto to have her 2021 property taxes cancelled, reduced, or refunded due to sickness or extreme poverty under section 323(1)(e) of the City of Toronto Act, 2006.

The Assessment Review Board found that the Applicant had sufficient funds in her bank accounts to pay the outstanding 2021 property taxes of $1,403.04, without cutting from the necessities of life.

As the Applicant failed to demonstrate an inability to pay, the application was dismissed.

The appellant appealed the property tax assessments for a large retail building centre for the 2018 through 2022 taxation years.

The parties agreed on the value of the improvements but disputed the land value.

The appellant argued for a lower current value based on an alternative approach averaging their expert's cost approach and a time-adjusted appraisal report.

The Board rejected the appellant's evidence, finding the comparable sales used were too small and the appraisal report was unreliable as its author did not testify and its effective date was outside the valuation date.

The Board accepted the respondent's expert evidence of land value based on comparable sales, which supported a higher current value than the returned assessment.

As the respondent did not seek an increase, the Board confirmed the returned assessments.

The property owners appealed the current value assessment of their waterfront property for the 2017 to 2022 taxation years.

The Assessment Review Board determined the base current value using the direct comparison approach, preferring the respondent's comparable sales data.

The Board applied a 17.4% negative adjustment to account for poor lot conditions, including significant year-round flooding and a weedy shoreline, consistent with a prior Board decision.

The Board declined to apply a further negative adjustment for proximity to an alleged commercial property due to insufficient evidence.

The final assessed value was reduced to $404,800.

The appellants filed a request for review of an Assessment Review Board decision that determined the current value of their commercial property at $6,928,000 for the 2017-2022 taxation years.

The appellants argued that the hearing member erred in using the respondent's property sales for comparison, rejected their evidence unfairly, failed to consider an equitable reduction, and inappropriately considered past renovations.

They also sought to introduce new evidence.

The Board dismissed the request for review, finding no errors in the original decision, no procedural unfairness, and that the new evidence did not meet the criteria for admission.

The appellant appealed the property assessment for the 2020 to 2022 taxation years, arguing that the current value of the property had decreased due to COVID-19 regulatory restrictions.

The respondent brought a motion to dismiss the appeals, arguing that the correct valuation day remained January 1, 2016, and that the issue of the property's value as of that date had already been resolved by a settlement agreement for the 2018 and 2019 taxation years.

The Assessment Review Board found that the correct valuation day was January 1, 2016, and applied the doctrine of issue estoppel to prevent the appellant from re-litigating the property's value.

The appeals were dismissed.

The Assessment Review Board held a settlement conference regarding property assessment appeals for a Bell switching station in Toronto.

The parties agreed on the current use valuation, replacement cost, and capitalization rate, but disputed the fair market rent, vacancy allowance, expense allowance, and equity.

The Board issued a case management order setting the hearing dates, witness schedule, and procedural directions for the upcoming video conference hearing.

The appellant brought a motion requesting that the Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC) be prohibited from relying on undisclosed lease, income, and expense information from comparable properties in its evidence.

MPAC argued it was prohibited from disclosing such information under s. 53(1) of the Assessment Act.

The Assessment Review Board dismissed the motion, finding that the appellant had a remedy available to request a disclosure order under s. 53(5) of the Act but chose not to exercise it.

The Board held that MPAC may rely on properly undisclosed information in its evidence, and the adjudicator retains discretion to weigh the evidence.

The moving party property owner sought to extend the due dates in the Schedule of Events for property assessment appeals initiated by the municipality.

The moving party argued that exceptional circumstances, including the death of her spouse, the COVID-19 pandemic, and illness, justified the extension.

The Assessment Review Board denied the motion, finding no nexus between the cited events and the failure to meet the appeal deadlines.

The Board also noted that even if exceptional circumstances existed, it would not exercise its discretion to extend the time because the municipality and the Municipal Property Assessment Corporation had already agreed to settle the appeals, and the prejudice of restarting the process outweighed the prejudice to the moving party.

The Municipal Property Assessment Corporation brought a motion to prevent a proposed witness from acting as an expert witness in property assessment appeals, arguing the witness had acted as an advocate for the appellant.

The Assessment Review Board dismissed the motion as premature, noting that under Rule 14(b) of the Board's Rules of Practice and Procedure, a representative cannot act as both an advocate and a witness in a general proceeding without leave of the Board.

Since the appellant had not yet sought leave, it was unnecessary and improper to preemptively bar the witness.

The Appellants, owners of car rental businesses at Pearson International Airport, brought a motion requesting an extension of time to amend their Statement of Issues for the 2021 taxation year.

They argued that the COVID-19 pandemic caused a change in the 'state and condition' of their properties, requiring an annual reassessment of current value under the Assessment Act.

The Assessment Review Board dismissed the motion, finding that the Act prescribes a fixed valuation day (January 1, 2016) for the entire assessment cycle and does not permit an annual reassessment of current value based on changing market conditions or a 'state and condition' paradigm.

The appellant appealed the property assessment for the 2021 and 2022 taxation years.

The Municipal Property Assessment Corporation brought a motion to dismiss the appeals on the basis of issue estoppel, arguing that the issues raised—namely the property's current value and the impact of a prior expropriation—had already been determined by the Board in a previous decision concerning the 2017-2020 taxation years.

The Board found that the current value and the expropriation issue had indeed been decided previously and could not be re-litigated.

The motion was granted and the appeals were dismissed.

The appellant sought tax relief for the 2020 and 2021 taxation years under s. 357(1)(a) of the Municipal Act, arguing that a zoning by-law amendment permitting multi-residential development constituted a 'change event' that made the property eligible for reclassification from Commercial to Multi-Residential.

The Assessment Review Board denied the appeals, finding that a change in zoning does not equate to a change in use.

Because the property remained vacant until construction commenced in 2021, no change event occurred during the applicable taxation years.

The appellants appealed the omitted assessment of their residential property for the 2019 taxation year, which was deemed to include the 2020, 2021, and 2022 taxation years.

The omitted assessment of $17,000 was applied due to a building permit for a secondary structure, which the parties agreed was not advanced enough to be assessed.

The Board determined the current value of the property to be $362,000 based on its time-adjusted sale price, rejecting the appellants' argument that their purchase was made under duress.

However, the Board reduced the assessment to $347,000 to achieve equitable assessment, applying a 4% reduction based on the median assessment-to-sale ratio of similar properties in the vicinity.

The moving party property owner brought a motion to extend the due dates in the Schedule of Events for property assessment appeals initiated by the municipality.

The moving party argued that the death of her spouse, the COVID-19 pandemic, and her own illness constituted exceptional circumstances under Rule 40 of the Board's Rules of Practice and Procedure.

The Board dismissed the motion, finding no nexus between the cited events and the failure to participate in the appeals, as the events occurred well before the commencement date or were not temporally linked to the missed deadlines.

The Board also noted that the other parties had already agreed to settle the appeals.

The appellant brought a motion to amend the Schedule of Events to allow one month to serve an expert report.

The appellant's previous legal representative had failed to procure and file an expert report despite being paid to do so, which the appellant only discovered shortly before the hearing.

The Assessment Review Board found these constituted exceptional circumstances under Rule 40.

Balancing the prejudice, the Board found the prejudice to the appellant of proceeding without expert evidence outweighed the delay prejudice to the respondent.

The motion was granted.

The City of Greater Sudbury appealed the current value assessments of six active mining properties for the 2017 to 2021 taxation years, arguing that the assessments were too low.

The Assessment Review Board determined the current values using the cost approach.

The Board accepted the evidence of the Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC) and the respondent property owners regarding the reproduction cost new, depreciation, and land value, rejecting the City's proposed adjustments and global depreciation caps as unsupported.

The Board confirmed the current values as determined by MPAC and found no equitable reduction was required.

The appellant appealed its property tax assessments, arguing that its telecommunication towers should be classified as exempt from taxation under s. 3(1)(21) of the Assessment Act.

The Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC) brought a motion to dismiss the appeals on the basis that the Assessment Review Board lacks jurisdiction to determine exemption status.

The Board granted the motion, finding that property 'classification' under the Act does not include exemption status, and that the Board's statutory jurisdiction under s. 40(1) does not permit it to adjudicate disputes regarding tax exemptions.

The Board also held it has no general jurisdiction to grant equitable relief regarding exemptions.

The appeals were dismissed.

In a property assessment appeal, the City of Vaughan brought a motion to call a witness to provide oral testimony regarding a comparable sales analysis, despite failing to file a witness statement or expert report by the required deadline.

The City argued the witness would provide lay opinion evidence admissible under the Statutory Powers Procedure Act.

The Assessment Review Board dismissed the request to call the witness, finding that the proposed testimony constituted expert opinion evidence on property valuation, which requires a compliant expert report under the Board's Rules.

The Board permitted the late filing of the City's Statement of Response, but clarified it could only be used to raise issues and not as evidence.

The City of Hamilton brought a motion seeking disclosure from Cadillac Fairview and MPAC regarding property assessment appeals for the CF Lime Ridge Mall.

Cadillac Fairview opposed the motion, arguing the City failed to comply with the deadlines set out in the Schedule of Events.

The Assessment Review Board found that the City missed the deadlines for bringing the motion and failed to demonstrate exceptional circumstances to warrant an extension.

Consequently, the Board denied the City's motion for disclosure.

The appellants appealed the omitted assessments applied by MPAC for the 2018 and 2019 taxation years following a renovation and addition to their mixed-use property, which also triggered deemed appeals for 2020, 2021, and 2022.

The Assessment Review Board rejected MPAC's direct sales comparison approach and adopted the appellants' cost approach, determining the current value to be $1,679,000.

The Board further applied an equity reduction based on an Assessment to Sale Ratio study, reducing the final assessment to $1,588,000 for the 2020-2022 taxation years, and adjusted the 2018 and 2019 omitted assessments accordingly.