Calgary City Council Raises Residential Property Taxes by 8.9 Percent, Criticizes Provincial Tax Hike

Calgary Mayor Jyoti Gondek. The Canadian Press/Jeff McIntosh

The City of Calgary is hiking property taxes by 8.9 percent in 2025 after the provincial government in its recent budget announced plans to collect more in property taxes to cover rising education costs. 

At its council meeting on March 18, Calgary city council approved the increase following discussions on the yearly property taxes the city, like other municipalities in Alberta, must collect on behalf of the province in addition to its own municipal property taxes.

This year’s budget provided for new provincial investment in K–12 education in order to address significant enrolment growth due to a population surge in recent years.

Overall for Calgarians, that equates to a 6.4 percent property tax hike broadly speaking—which breaks down to an 8.9 percent increase for residential property owners and 2.8 percent for non-residential property owners.

The average Calgary homeowner will pay about $240 more per year, according to the city’s mayor, Jyoti Gondek, who added that Edmonton homeowners, for example, will only pay $90 more per year, saying that “Calgary is being used as a financial crutch for the province.”

Councillor Andre Chabot says the “main issue” has to do with the shift to having homeowners bear the brunt of the tax hike.

“Some of the charts that we have in this report actually clearly demonstrate who is the greatest beneficiary of that tax shift, and it’s predominantly the office towers downtown,” Chabot said. “If we’re going to do a tax shift to benefit businesses, we should be focusing on those smaller businesses.”

Mayor Gondek raised the possibility of voting “no” to the province’s 2025 requisition for property taxes. However, the city would then be unable to collect property taxes legally at all.

“I get that we have to approve it,” said Chabot, adding that “we are penalized by the fact that we’re successful as a municipal entity, and by encouraging people to move here, which has pushed our assessment values up.”

But the motion didn’t pass unconditionally. Council voted in favour of invoicing the provincial government for the services, including labour and materials, that the city must provide in order to collect taxes for the province. City assessor Eddie Lee estimated the province’s proportional share of the cost to be around $10 million.

Despite calling this move “an overtly political manoeuvre,” Councillor Gian-Carlo Carra voted yes so as to protest the provincial government’s tax levy and “to raise awareness.”

Mayor Gondek disagreed that billing the province was politically driven. “I think this isn’t just political; this isn’t just a signal. This is leadership in action,” she said. “I think it’s high time that we realize that we need to recover our costs.”

The mayor also highlighted the need to make it clear to Calgarians who is responsible for the tax hike when bills are mailed out in May.

Alberta’s Population Growth, New Schools

Justin Brattinga, press secretary to Finance Minister Nate Horner, said Calgary’s decision to invoice the province amounts to blaming the city’s “rampant overspending” on the province and is meant to divert attention so that city council can “save their re-election campaigns.”

“This is an attempt to distract Calgarians from the fact that they are raising their property taxes for the fourth year in a row,” Brattinga stated. “If the city can’t manage collecting the taxes we’re sure someone will step forward in October’s election that can.”

Alberta put forward a 4.5 percent increase for K–12 education in its Budget 2025, amounting to $9.9 billion in 2025–26, amid rising enrolment pressures and staffing shortages.

Among other items, a nearly $1.1 billion investment over 3 years will address the province’s growth by hiring more than 4,000 new teachers and classroom support staff.

As part of renewing educational infrastructure, the budget allocated funding for 30 new schools, according to the provincial government’s 2025–28 fiscal plan.

“Population growth has been a major challenge for Alberta over the last two years,” Horner stated on X on March 21. “Budget 2025 meets that challenge by investing in 30 new schools and more modernizations and replacements.”

Eighteen of those new schools are in Calgary and the surrounding area.

In an education property tax fact sheet, the province says Calgary taxpayers will contribute $1.037 billion in education property tax in 2025–26, while Edmonton taxpayers will contribute $575 million.

Education property taxes will make up 31.6 percent of education operating costs in the new fiscal year, increased from 29.5 percent in 2024–25, the fact sheet said, adding that these taxes support teachers’ salaries, textbooks, and classroom resources and are not used to fund government operations, school capital costs, or teachers’ pensions.