Rocky Mountain House council has approved a 2.97 per cent municipal property tax increase for 2026 following a rise in overall property assessments.

For the average homeowner, that amounts to an increase of about $71 annually, or roughly $5.90 per month.

For commercial properties, the increase averages $217 for small businesses and $634 for larger businesses.

Under Alberta’s Municipal Government Act, municipalities are required to pass annual tax rate bylaws each spring to generate enough revenue to balance operating budgets and fund municipal services.

For Rocky, those services are set to cost over $29 million in 2026.

Betty Quinlan, the town’s director of Corporate Services, said the 2.97 per cent increase is lower than what some other smaller municipalities are facing, noting some communities are considering increases as high as 12 per cent.

Towns like Whitecourt and Drayton Valley have seen larger increases. Clearwater County approved a one per cent tax rate increase, while Brazeau County held taxes steady.

Driving the tax bump is a year-over-year increase in overall assessment by $51.2 million to over $1.1 billion. However, the majority of the increase is due to inflation ($36.5 million). New assessments accounted for $14.6 million which added $70,000 in tax revenue.

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Another pressure is the educational requisition portion of residents’ tax notices. Town documents show a 2026 increase of seven per cent overall, going from $3.2 million to $3.4 million with an increase of $224,000. However, that was lower than the 2025 increase of $343,000.

However, Quinlan says most of the increase will be going right to services residents rely on day-after-day.

For the “cost of a cup of coffee”, Quinlan says revenue will be going right to the three top town-provided services: policing, road improvements, and recreation and culture.

Future Strategic Planning Considerations

During council discussions, Coun. Denise Boniface raised the idea of imposing higher taxes on abandoned or derelict properties — particularly in the downtown core — to help reduce tax pressure on other ratepayers.

CAO Dean Krause referenced a City of Edmonton program that applies higher tax rates to vacant or abandoned buildings as a way to discourage properties from sitting unused.

Krause said implementing a similar system in Rocky Mountain House would likely require the creation of a new assessment subclass for unoccupied buildings. He added it would be too late to implement such a measure for 2026, but suggested it could become part of future strategic planning discussions.

For 2026, tax rates for both residential and non-residential vacant properties were kept unchanged from the previous year.

Council accepted the 2.97 per cent increase unanimously.