FRIDAY
June 2, 1995

BA pit stop in
the gardai: 11

HB Weekly Real Estate
listings: 37 — 68

Volvo's 960 upscale
family wagon: 25

& Big Brother gots
street smart: 27

“Bl Crossword........ see OD

WN. Shore Alert............8
Shore Shots... 16
i Tide Charts... 34
TY Listings...

-The caboose is loose.
Rail move revises train
configuration.

‘Weather

Saturday: Sun and clouds,
Highs 19°C, lows 10°C,

NEWS photo Mike Waketleld

MANAGER KATHLEEN Houston sorts a sea of plastic milk jugs at Internationa! Paper Industries" Riverside Drive property. The
B.C. Court of Appeal ruled that such activity does not commercially benefit the company, so it can now get a tax exemption.

Ruling recycles payment made

A B.C. Court of Appeal ruling that
reinstates a partial tax-exemption for a
local company that coliects recyclables
will also see the firm recover absut

$20,000 from the tax man.

By lan Noble
News Reporter

Emmie Leung, International ~— Paper
Industries Ltd.'s (IPL) chief executive officer,
suid the Municipal Act exempts land used for
pollution abatement from paying property

taxes.

But for the past four or five years, IP} has
paid property taxes on the 65% of its 132
Riverside Drive property that is used to transfer
recyclable products from trucks to seimi-trailers
before being trucked to recycling companies,

A-B.C. Court of Appeat ruling May 24 deter-
mined the area is tax exempt.

Leung said she-will receive approximately
$20,000 in tax money back. from “Narth
Vancouver District.

“Of course it’s great but the key part is we”

are supposed to get It anyway.” said Leung. “We
had to fight to get it bac

She estimates the exercise cost her company
several thousand dollars in legal fees.

The other 35% of the less than 2,700-sq.-m
(30,000-sg.-ft.) property is a head office and not
under dispute, said Leung.

{PI's contract with the North Shore recycling
program pays the collection. company about
$1.5 million a year to collect recyclables in

West Vancouver District, and North Vancouver :

City and District.

Recycling program coordinator A} Lynch
said the program recovers about $400,000 of
that amount by selling the recyclable materials.

However, this year the program expects to
receive about $800,000 from sales, thanks to
newspapers, which make up about 75% of recy-
clables collected.

“The paper market has just gone out of
sight.” said Lynch,

He added paper now fetch
fonne,

Five years’ ago, it bottomed out at $54 a
tonne.

s $169 u metric

Plastic milk and pop bottles are also worth .

nore now, he said.
{mtemational Paper's contract with the recy-
cling program is up in Octuber, said Ly neh.
The ping pong batde over tax status began

_ witha 1991 Coun of Revision confirmation that

68% of the property was taxable.

A BC, Assessment Appeal Board reversed
that decision.

Then, that reversal was reversed by the B.C.
Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court ruling found that IPI's -
North Vancouver transfer area was.a_ step in
converting waste products to commercial prod-
ucts.

No market for the recyclables would exist if
they were not bulked, compacted or baled, said
the court.

Therefore, 65% of the property was classi-
fied as light industry and property taxes applied.
But the new ruling reverses that decision.

The B.C. Court of Appeal said “at the site of
the improvements in question, the collected
waste materials are simply sorted and bulked
for shipment clsewhere.”

Paper and other recyclables are converted
into recycled products elsewhere.

In IPS's contract with the municipalities,
money received from collected materials must
be returned to municipalities.

“Consequently.” stated the B.C. Court of
Appeal, “bulked waste cannot be said to be a
commercial product of the appellant.”

The ruling said the improvements —- includ-
ing 2 concrete apron, fencing, gates, and a
weigh scale — are entitled to the benefit of the
pollution abatement exemption.

John R. Lakes, lawyer for IPI, said the asses-
sor could appeal the B.C. Court of Appeals
decision to the Supreme Court of Canada. °

But he added similar attempts to appeal to
the national court have been denied because
such cases are not national issues.

An appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada
“could do nothing more. than delay the settle-
ment,” Lakes said.