News Release: Taxpayers call on Vancouver City Council to cut taxes in 2026
VANCOUVER, B.C.: Vancouver City Council needs to cut property taxes for families and businesses who are fighting to afford the basics.
“Vancouverites are struggling with some of the highest costs of living on the planet and these tax hikes from city hall make it even harder to make ends meet,” said Carson Binda, B.C. Director for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. “Taxpayers want tax cuts, not more tax hikes.”
Today’s budget outlook meeting suggested tax hikes as high as seven per cent.
Five to six per cent of the proposed increase is for operating expenses while an additional one per cent of the increase is being earmarked by city hall staff for infrastructure.
Mayor Ken Sim tabled a motion to get city hall staff to explore options to increase the operating taxes by between zero and 2.5 per cent instead of hiking taxes higher.
Sim’s motion passed.
Three city councilors, Rebbecca Bligh, Peter Fry and Sean Orr, abstained from supporting Sim’s motion.
“It’s shameful for councilors Bligh, Fry and Orr to oppose even studying options for a smaller tax hike,” Binda said. “Families and businesses are worried about how they’re going to pay bills and those three councilors are ignoring those folks.”
On the low end, the mayor’s suggestion would lead to a total property tax hike of one per cent.
The current city council has hiked property taxes by more than 22 per cent over the past three years.
Inflation has increased by 4.5 per cent in that same period, according to the Bank of Canada’s inflation calculator.
In the past five years, the city’s bureaucracy has increased by 1,000 full-time staff members, from 8,682 in 2021 to 9,666 in 2025.
Executive pay has dramatically increased at city hall. In 2022, 3,014 city bureaucrats appeared on the Vancouver Sun’s sunshine list of bureaucrats making top dollar; this year’s edition included 4,083 bureaucrats.
“Taxpayers can’t afford higher taxes and an even more bloated bureaucracy,” Binda said. “Council must cut the bureaucracy and sky-high salaries to save taxpayers money and cut taxes.”