IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ctf/journl/v62y2014i3p635-670.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

User Fee Design by Canadian Municipalities: Considerations Arising from the Case Law

Author

Listed:
  • Kelly I.E. Farish

    (Lawson Lundell LLP, Vancouver)

  • Lindsay M. Tedds

    (School of Public Administration, University of Victoria)

Abstract

Municipal governments in Canada have come to rely increasingly on user fees to fund local services, as they struggle to deal with the combined pressures of federal and provincial devolution of responsibility for such services and the political costs of raising property taxes. While there is a substantial body of literature regarding the rationale for user fees, little information exists about how to design and implement a user fee so as to ensure that it satisfies the legal requirements for imposing this type of levy. The authors provide a detailed review of the existing Canadian case law to highlight key legal, technical, and administrative issues facing municipalities in designing and implementing user fees. The discussion focuses in particular on the principal legal tests for user fees and the application of those tests in specific cases. Through their analysis, the authors draw attention to several unresolved issues and inconsistencies in the application and interpretation of the tests, which need to be navigated and addressed by the courts.

Suggested Citation

  • Kelly I.E. Farish & Lindsay M. Tedds, 2014. "User Fee Design by Canadian Municipalities: Considerations Arising from the Case Law," Canadian Tax Journal, Canadian Tax Foundation, vol. 62(3), pages 635-670.
    • Handle: RePEc:ctf:journl:v:62:y:2014:i:3:p:635-670
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.ctf.ca/EN/Publications/CTJ_Contents/2014CTJ3.aspx
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Catherine Althaus & Lindsay M. Tedds & Allen McAvoy, 2011. "The Feasibility of Implementing a Congestion Charge on the Halifax Peninsula: Filling the "Missing Link" of Implementation," Canadian Public Policy, University of Toronto Press, vol. 37(4), pages 541-561, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Tedds, Lindsay M. & Euper, Brock, 2019. "The Costs of Energy-related Linear Property on Local Governments in Canada and the Role of That Local Government Revenue Tool Can Play in Addressing these Costs," MPRA Paper 96918, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Cameron, Anna & Khanal, Mukesh & Tedds, Lindsay M., 2022. "Managing Airbnb: A Cross-Jurisdictional Review of Approaches for Regulating the Short-Term Rental Market," MPRA Paper 111535, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. Tedds, Lindsay M., 2017. "User charges for Municipal Infrastructure in Western Canada," MPRA Paper 96920, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Tedds, Lindsay M., 2018. "Non-tax Revenue for Funding Municipal Governments: Take-up, Constraints, and Emerging Opportunities," MPRA Paper 96919, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Tedds, Lindsay M., 2019. "Who Pays for Municipal Governments? Pursuing the User Pay Model," MPRA Paper 96915, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Tedds, Lindsay M., 2019. "Who Pays for Municipal Governments? Pursuing the User Pay Model," MPRA Paper 96915, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Tedds, Lindsay M., 2017. "User charges for Municipal Infrastructure in Western Canada," MPRA Paper 96920, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. Dalumpines, Ron & Scott, Darren M., 2017. "Determinants of route choice behavior: A comparison of shop versus work trips using the Potential Path Area - Gateway (PPAG) algorithm and Path-Size Logit," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 59-68.
    4. Tedds, Lindsay M., 2018. "Non-tax Revenue for Funding Municipal Governments: Take-up, Constraints, and Emerging Opportunities," MPRA Paper 96919, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Fees; user charges; municipal finance; tax law;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H27 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Other Sources of Revenue
    • H71 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ctf:journl:v:62:y:2014:i:3:p:635-670. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Jim Lyons (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.ctf.ca/EN .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.