The Town of Carman and R.M. of Dufferin are moving forward with their shares of funding for a new personal care home in Carman.

The Town of Carman has given first reading to a borrowing by-law that would allow it to borrow $1 million in order to meet its financial commitment to the project.

The R.M. of Dufferin is set to give first reading to its own similar by-law in February.

According to the proposed Local Improvement Plan, funding contributions of $3.5 million from the Town of Carman and R.M.s of Dufferin, Grey, Roland and Thompson, along with a public donation of $3.5 million, will give an equity position of $7 million to secure a mortgage for the balance of the project cost.

The borrowing by-laws will be approved in the coming months and will allow for tax bills in the Town of Carman and R.M. of Dufferin to increase over the next 15 years in order to cover the annual loan payments.

Carman Mayor, Bob Mitchell, explained that the Town's local improvement levy will applied to each assessable property in the community.

"Ours is a little bit different than some of the other (communities) because we're taxing businesses, utilities, we're taxing everything."

He added that the size of tax increase will depend on property assessment values. For example, Mitchell explained that a residential property assessed at $300,000 will see an increase of about $100. He noted however that the percentages on commercial property are bit higher dollar-for-dollar, which means a business assessed at $300,000 will likely see an increase of $130.

No one attended last week Thursday's public hearing for the Town of Carman proposal and, as of interview time, Mayor Mitchell said the administration office hadn't received any written feedback - positive or negative.

Meantime, the R.M. of Dufferin is taking a different approach.

The Municipality's local improvement levy will only be applied to residential properties that have a dwelling. This means each household will be charged about $101 per year for 15 years.

Reeve George Gray said this plan did raise some concerns among ratepayers, which were expressed at public hearing Tuesday evening.

"(They) wondered why it was on residences and we indicated that it was probably the fairest and most equitable way to do it," he explained.

Gray added that putting this tax on each assessable property in the R.M. of Dufferin would put a further strain on landowners who are already paying ever-rising taxes on farmland.

Gray noted there was another concern raised at the hearing.

"There are some people that have residences that are still livable and habitable as deemed by the Assessment Branch, but they're vacant at the moment and they're concerned about paying the extra hundred dollars per year in something that doesn't have a resident in it."

He explained that, according to the Assessment Branch, there are 879 residences in the R.M. of Dufferin and this is the number that Council has to go by when setting the levy.

Despite these concerns, Gray said Council will move forward in passing first-reading of the bylaw in February.

He did say however that Council will offer a few varieties of payment methods.

Ratepayers will be given the option of making a one-time payment of about $1,200 instead of 15 payments of $101.43 for an estimated total of $1,500 - a savings of around $300.

Council is also looking to offer a local debenture on all, or a portion, of what it is asking, to be paid at the current rate.

Gray explained that this is a similar strategy to what the R.M. used when helping to finance the arena project a number of years ago. He noted however that this option would not change how Council raises the money to pay back the loan.

According to the Local Improvement Plan public notices, the money offered by the communities will be used exclusively for Phase One of the PCH project. All other phases of will be self-financed.

Phase One will see a new 80-bed personal care home built to replace the 70-bed Boyne Lodge. The Lodge will then be converted to create 30 'waiting placement' beds on the 2nd floor as well as office space to be leased by Southern Health-Sante Sud on the main floor.

The total estimated cost of Phase One is $21 million.