E-16 - Real Estate Assessment Act

Section 21 Disposition versions

1977-12-31

21. The total municipal real estate taxes on a farm or woodlot, including the houses and the other buildings found thereon and intended for its operation, must not annually exceed one per cent of its taxable value, which, as regards the land, must not exceed one hundred and fifty dollars per acre.

The Minister of Agriculture shall reimburse the owner or occupant of a farm contemplated by the first paragraph thirty-five per cent of the amount of school taxes imposed on such immoveables; if such owner or occupant is a farm producer within the meaning of the Farm Producers Act, the reimbursement shall be forty per cent of the municipal real estate and school taxes.

However, the immoveables contemplated by the first paragraph may be subject to compensation for municipal services from which they benefit; the amount thereof is fixed by the municipal council and, when it exceeds one hundred and fifty dollars per year, an appeal lies before the Commission; that appeal must be made within sixty days following the coming into force of the decision of the municipal council by a writing transmitted to the clerk of the municipal corporation. If less than one-quarter of the interested persons appeal, the decision of the council is upheld; otherwise, the clerk of the municipal corporation must forthwith send to the Commission a certificate attesting that at least one-quarter of the interested persons appealed from the decision of the municipal council; in this case, the Commission must hold a public inquiry and may uphold the decision of the municipal council or reduce the amount fixed by the council.

This section shall cease to apply to such farms or woodlots as soon as the ownership of them is transferred to a person, partnership or corporation who or which acquired them for purposes of subdivision into lots, residential, industrial or commercial development, speculation or real estate operations; however, it shall again apply to them when such farms or woodlots are returned to the vendor or his legal representatives as a result of a rescission of the sale, a giving in payment or a judgment ordering such rescission or giving in payment.

If this section ceases to apply to a farm or a woodlot under the previous paragraph following a final decision, the party against whom the decision is rendered, or his legal assigns, shall owe the municipal corporation and the school board the excess of the real estate taxes which should have been paid on the farm or woodlot since its acquisition by the said party, for not more than five municipal and school fiscal years respectively.

1971, c. 50, s. 21; 1973, c. 31, s. 13; 1975, c. 68, s. 9.