An investigation concerning the disclosure of
personal information through public property registries
March 31, 1998
David H. Flaherty
Information and Privacy Commissioner
of British Columbia
Victoria, British Columbia V8V 1X4
tel. (250) 387-5629
fax. (250) 387-1696
Web Site: http://www.oipbc.org
2. An Overview of the Property Assessment System in British Columbia
3. The Assessment Roll and the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act
4. The Municipal Property Tax Roll 5. How does Publication of the Name and Address Ensure Taxation Fairness?
6. "Open to Inspection" A Broad or Narrow Interpretation?
Conclusions and Recommendations
Executive Summary
In September, 1996, the City of Victoria announced it was becoming the first
municipality in Canada to provide property assessment information to the public
through the Internet. The City's Information Systems Manager stated:
Our new system will make available property assessment information to the
public via the City of Victoria's home page, twenty-four hours per day, seven
days a week. Our goal is to provide increased service to our customers through
easy and quick access to the information.
The new service would allow the public to search the database by property
owner's name, address and Roll number. Further search would yield the location
of the property, assessed values, actual values, legal description, current
year tax levy and "other related information about the property." On the first
day of operation, "Assessing OnLine" received more than fifteen thousand
visitors--most of those local.[1] Until then,
the City of Victoria had received an average of twenty-five to thirty calls per
day inquiring about property assessments.
The ensuing commotion focused attention on the unintended consequences of
automating databases which have traditionally been regarded as "public"
databases. The City of Victoria was caught off guard by public criticism
accusing them of running roughshod over the privacy of property owners in
Victoria, when in fact, the information it provided over the Internet could be
accessed through a number of other sources,
Nonetheless, the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner received a
number of complaints from citizens concerned about their privacy. In response
to these concerns, the City of Victoria removed the names of the homeowners
from the Internet site until the privacy issues could be investigated more
thoroughly. The Commissioner's Office undertook to conduct such an
investigation and issues this report as a summary of its findings.
Specifically, the Commissioner's report focuses on the privacy issues
surrounding the publication of personal information in property databases. It
examines the wider assessment system and most specifically, the BC Assessment
Authority (BC Assessment), which assumes the lead role in the property
assessment system in British Columbia. The actions of the BC Assessment
Authority are guided by the Assessment Act, the Assessment
Authority Act, and the taxing provisions in a number of statutes such as
the Municipal Act, Taxation (Rural Area) Act and the Vancouver
Charter.
This report begins by examining the general premise that property information,
whether in the custody of the Land Title Branch, BC Assessment or one of the
many municipalities or regional districts, is "public" information. There is a
widely-held assumption that information in such "public" registers need not be
protected at all, or that only very limited protections are needed.[2] It is this Office's position that public
records pose a challenge to the privacy rights of citizens and, once in digital
format, pose an even greater challenge to those privacy rights. Digital
technology fundamentally changes the nature of public records as the paper
record decomposes and becomes discrete pieces of information that can be
searched, manipulated and reconfigured in ways that may improve efficiencies
but were never intended by the legislature.[3]
In short, from a privacy perspective, information which is "public"
information is vulnerable to misuse, particularly when the information is
provided in an electronic format. One of the goals of the ]
including the BC Assessment Authority, BC OnLine and the Land Title Registry.
Property databases are made available for inspection to permit the comparison
of the value of one property to another for taxation purposes. However, these
databases can be used for inappropriate purposes. They can be used to compile
mailing lists for solicitation; as a locational device to track down the
address of another person; as part of a financial profile or simply to satisfy
a curiosity about another person. The Office of the Information and Privacy
Commissioner does not believe that information collected for the purposes of
property tax assessments should be accessible for unauthorized purposes nor
exempt from the privacy protections set out in Part 3 of the Freedom of
Information and Protection of Privacy Act.
This Office acknowledges that obvious benefits accrue to society through the
availability of public databases such as the Assessment Roll, the Corporate
Registry, and Land Title Registry. Volumes of business transactions depend on
the quick availability of such information. Furthermore, the availability of
other sorts of records, such as court records, promotes greater accountability
of public bodies and serves an educative function. The debate concerning
public records centers on striking the balance between providing personal
information that is necessary and useful to realize a public policy goal, while
at the same time protecting the privacy of the data subjects as much as
possible. The challenge, from our perspective, is to develop information
guidelines which promote the policy goal while at the same time give
individuals some control over the use of their personal information contained
in a particular database.
To achieve this goal, we make four recommendations.
The first is that property registries such as the Assessment Roll should be
searchable by property address only. This would prevent the Assessment
Roll from being used as a locational device and protect, to a certain extent,
those vulnerable people who have an interest in suppressing information which
would reveal their home address.
Second, we are recommending that those public bodies which make available
property information clearly state the legitimate purposes for which property
registries may be inspected, and discourage any other use of those
registries.
Our third recommendation is that in the case of bulk sales of property
registry data, whether in electronic, microfiche or hard copy format, the name
of property owners should be suppressed.
Finally, provisions should be made to suppress personal information in cases
where individuals can reasonably demonstrate that disclosure of their personal
information would jeopardize their safety, or that of their family.
This report examines the creation and use of property databases
maintained by BC Assessment and the various municipalities and districts. It
examines how the personal information of property owners, specifically their
names and mailing addresses, are collected, used, and disclosed by BC
Assessment and/or by taxing jurisdictions. This report also examines whether
these activities conform with the fair information practices contained
in 1. Scope of this Report
"Fair information practices" form the basis of virtually all privacy
legislation worldwide, including the BC Freedom of Information and
Protection of Privacy Act. They incorporate the following principles:
In British Columbia, these principles are incorporated into the Freedom of
Information and Protection of Privacy Act and specifically require that
public bodies:
The property assessment system in British Columbia is essentially a two-step
operation involving the BC Assessment Authority and taxing authorities.
In 1974, the British Columbia Assessment Authority was created by the
Assessment Authority Act and replaced all of the municipal and
provincial government assessment offices. BC Assessment operates as an
independent, publicly-funded corporation whose mandate is to produce and
maintain uniform property assessments throughout the province. The
newly-created Assessment Authority replaced the previous system whereby
individual municipalities assessed properties within their own borders. Under
the Assessment Act, all properties in British Columbia are classified in
terms of use (residential, farm, industrial, etc.) and given an estimate of
actual value by an appraiser. Sales information from the Land Title Branch is
sent to BC Assessment where it is used to develop common units of comparison
and corresponding values. Residential properties are assessed on a number of
variables, including size, layout and age, as compared to similar properties in
the same area, available services, neighbourhood influences and local market
conditions. This provincial property database contains information on
approximately 1.6 million properties.
This information is used to form the basis of the Assessment Roll. The Roll
is produced exclusively for the various taxing authorities such as the City of
Vancouver, municipalities, regional districts, towns, villages and the
province. Each entry in the Assessment Roll contains a number of prescribed
items, including the property owner's name, property owner's mailing address,
Assessment Roll number, civic address of the property (which may be different
from the property owner's home address), and actual value of the land and
improvements. Notices of assessment are mailed to all property owners on the
last day of the calendar year.
The property assessment may be appealed by anyone, whether or not they have an
interest in the property. The appeal, called a "complaint," must be filed in
writing with the Court of Revision by the 31st of January. The Court of
Revision is required to hear all appeals and authenticate the Assessment Roll
by the following March 31. The decision of the Court of Revision can be
appealed to the Assessment Appeal Board, provided the appeal is filed by April
30.
The assessment database is broken down by local tax jurisdiction and delivered
to each jurisdiction once the Roll is completed. This is repeated in April
after the Roll is authenticated by the Court of Revision. This Roll forms the
basis of the local Property Tax Roll, which is prepared by each local
government. Section 366 of the Municipal Act requires the municipal tax
collector to prepare a property tax Roll from the authenticated Assessment
Roll. To the assessed value of the land and improvements, municipal treasurers
apply the appropriate tax rate and calculate the gross property taxes and fees
owing. While the Assessment Roll is prepared by BC Assessment, the Property
Tax Roll belongs to the taxing authority. Tax notices are then sent to
property owners by the municipal tax collector.
Content of the Assessment Roll
Section 3(1) of the Assessment Act requires the Commissioner of the BC
Assessment Authority to complete a new Assessment Roll and mail an assessment
notice to each property owner on or before December 31 of each year.
Section 3(3) of the Assessment Act further provides that the Assessment Roll
shall contain information specified by regulation under the Assessment
Authority Act. BC Regulation 497/77 (Assessment Authority Act
Regulations) requires the following information be contained on the Assessment
Roll:
Purpose for which personal information may be collected
2. An Overview of the Property Assessment System in British Columbia
3. The Assessment Roll and the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act
The collection of information is "expressly authorized" under an Act if the
Act or regulations under that Act states that the information must be
collected. As the Assessment Authority Act Regulations require that the
name and address of the property owner be included on the Roll, the personal
information is collected in a manner authorized by section 26(a).
How personal information is to be collected
Section 27 of the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act
goes one step further by requiring public bodies to inform individuals from
whom it collects personal information, of the reason the personal information
is collected, and the authority under which it is being collected. This notice
may be suspended if it would defeat the purpose for which the information is
collected.
BC Assessment does not usually collect the name and mailing address of the
property directly from the property owner. Typically this information is
collected indirectly from the Land Title records. This is authorized by
section 3(4) of the Assessment Act, which requires the assessor to "use
the information contained in the records of the land title office as those
records stood on November 30 of the year in which the Assessment Roll is
completed."
BC Assessment does not notify homeowners that it is collecting personal
information or the purpose for collecting the personal information, other than
to tell property owners after-the-fact in the Property Assessment Notice that
"[t]he purpose of this notice is to provide you with an estimate of your
property value. This information will be used by the provincial government,
municipalities, regional districts, and hospital districts to calculate your
[current year] property taxes."
More importantly, BC Assessment does not notify property owners of the
numerous secondary uses the database is put to, an issue which is
discussed later on in this report.
Open to inspection
The Assessment Roll is made available for public inspection
under the authority of section 8 of the Assessment Act, which states:
"[o]n completion by the assessor, the real property Assessment Roll shall be
open to inspection during regular business hours."
Local governments set tax rates on their budgetary requirements, and a
property owner's share of the overall tax burden is determined by the assessed
value and classification of his/her property. As the value of one property may
affect the value of another and hence the distribution of the tax burden, the
right to appeal the assessment of property extends to all citizens and to all
properties, regardless of the ownership interest.
The Assessment Roll has historically been open to the public as a critical
factor in promoting fair and equitable property assessments. The public policy
reason for making the Roll "open for inspection" is that it promotes equity in
the taxation process by enabling precise comparison of the value of one
property to another in the same area. Property owners can then be satisfied
that the assessor has treated like properties equally, and the property tax
burden is assumed to be equitably shared. The question then becomes, how much
personal information must be disclosed to realize this public benefit,
and are there ways of realizing the benefit without unduly jeopardizing the
privacy of citizens?
Public Access to the Assessment Roll
The information on the Assessment Roll is repackaged in several
forms and can be accessed by the public in a variety of ways at a variety of
locations, with or without charge. The Roll is available for viewing free of
charge in hard copy and on microfiche at any Assessment Authority Area Office,
for a fee through BC OnLine, and available for purchase in its entirety on
microfiche and in electronic format through BC Assessment.
Assessment Authority Area Offices
Each of the 22 offices of the BC Assessment Authority makes available
assessment information pertaining to properties within its jurisdiction. This
information may be viewed in hard copy over the counter in the area office. No
information is given out over the telephone. Between December 31, 1997 and
January 31, 1998, BC Assessment received approximately 7040 office visits. This is a small
number when one considers that there are 1.6 million properties on the Roll.
As the Roll is available to anyone for inspection, but access is not monitored,
it cannot be determined if those visits were from property owners, curious
citizens, private investigators, realtors or those compiling mailing lists.
However, BC Assessment is confident that the visits were "from members of the
public questioning their assessments ... many of these taxpayers used the
microfiche or paper versions of the Assessment Roll available in area offices
to compare their assessment with those for other properties."[4]
In discussions with the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner, BC
Assessment said their staff have observed people at Assessment Area offices
with lap-top computers, where they sit and input batches of information from
the Assessment Roll for unknown purposes, which could include the compilation
of mailing lists.
BC OnLine
The Assessment Roll can be accessed for a fee through BC OnLine, an electronic
database currently administered by the Information Technology Services Division
(ITSD) of the Ministry of Employment and Investment. Other databases found on
BC OnLine include the Land Title Registry, Corporate Registry and the Personal
Property Registry. The impetus for BC OnLine was to provide a mechanism
whereby business and government could easily access information necessary for
general business transactions.
Clients subscribe to one, a combination, or all of the databases. There are
no restrictions as to who may become a subscriber to BC OnLine. On November 1,
1997, BC OnLine had 6,077 customer accounts, although not all of those are
"active." Of the 6,077 accounts, 1,525 were simple charge accounts without
on-line access to data; 4,552 accounts were granted on-line access to data.
Access to BC OnLine is governed by the BC OnLine Terms and Conditions set by
ITSD, which permit only the subscriber to access the database with the
appropriate passwords, called "userids". (As of November 1, 1997, there were
20,162 userids attached to the 4,552 on-line accounts.) For a fee, subscribers
can access information from the published Assessment Roll. Other information
on the Assessment Roll database includes Land Title Information and property
sales history. BC OnLine provides the ownership and assessment information
from the last completed Assessment Roll.
Every transaction on BC OnLine produces an audit trail. What this means is
that every time a property listing is accessed, BC OnLine creates a record
identifying who viewed the information. Audit trails are one way of protecting
the privacy of individuals because anonymous viewing of records is impossible.
During fiscal 1996/97, a total of 366,047 searches of the Assessment Roll were
done through BC OnLine. BC Assessment offers three types of searches, at
different prices, which produce different reports with increasing amounts of
detail. Last year, 160,692 searches were done by full fee paying customers,
which include the private sector and crown corporations, 197,110 searches were
done by governments (including municipalities) and 8,245 searches were done by
"no fee" users, which are either BC OnLine staff (testing or assisting
customers) or Government Agent Branch staff. The latter pay no fee to BC
OnLine, but collect statutory fees from the public when they sell information
over the counter.
In 1996, fifty-three percent of Assessment Roll searches were generated from
crown corporations, municipal, provincial and federal governments. The bulk of
the private sector users of BC OnLine are financial institutions, lawyers,
insurance companies, and realtors, who rely on assessment data for lending,
conveyancing and insurance transactions.
From a privacy perspective, the fee structure of BC OnLine provides a
disincentive for people to "browse" through the database, since every access to
every property record costs money. It thus would be prohibitively expensive to
construct a mailing list of property owners using BC OnLine. In addition,
usage of BC OnLine access to assessment information is monitored by BC
Assessment.
BC OnLine can be searched by name. In the interests of privacy protection, it
would be preferable if the database were searchable by property address
only. If this were the case, confirmation of ownership would take place
through a search by address, rather than confirmation of the property address
through a search by name. Information required for any transaction using BC
OnLine assessment data would remain available; however, a person's home address
could not be located through a simple name search.
The BC Government is considering the privatization of the electronic carrier
function of BC OnLine. This has raised serious privacy concerns among
different organizations, such as the Canadian Bar Association, which is
concerned that this privatization venture could create problems of
confidentiality, access, cost, and use of the data within the BC OnLine system
by a private carrier beyond what was originally intended:
The request for proposals (for the privatization of BC OnLine) states clearly that the purchaser will be allowed to create "value added services". This opens up a number of new possibilities in providing data, such as buying or adding new data to the existing data collection; generating new kinds of information from combined data sources (e.g. matching government data with third party credit, insurance, telephone or other data), providing new views of data (all mortgages held by a particular bank; all the properties which have no mortgages registered, etc.); providing information about who is searching for what; or provide a "watch for change" service which responds to events like the registration of changed ownership or when a specific person becomes a director of a company.[5]
The government consulted the Office of the Information and Privacy
Commissioner regarding appropriate privacy and confidentiality language in the
outsourcing process. We made recommendations concerning specific references to
the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act and clear
wording concerning confidentiality, security, custody and control, data
matching, and disclosure.
Microfiche
BC Assessment sells the Assessment Roll on microfiche. There are no
criteria with regard to who is able to purchase the Roll on microfiche.
Rather, BC Assessment restricts the use of the information in the microfiche.
On the microfiche Order Form, purchasers must sign the following agreement:
I acknowledge that the microfiche is sold on the understanding that it will not
be used nor made available:
1. for obtaining addresses for solicitation or mailing purposes of any kind,
2. in any way to harass members of the public, or
3. for any purpose that is contrary to law.
"Misusing the data" is defined by BC Assessment as using the information to
produce mailing lists or to harass the public. "Harassing the public" includes
unwanted contact with the public such as telephone solicitation or sending junk
mail. BC Assessment does not require harassment to be of an ongoing nature;
one incident of prohibited behavior is sufficient for a determination of
"harassment."[6] BC Assessment pointed out that
it is often difficult to determine whether a property owner's name and address
was taken from the Assessment Roll as opposed to other data sources, such as
the phone book, Land Title registries, the Canada 411 reverse database or other
private directories. Our concern is to ensure that the BC Assessment database
be used in compliance with fair information practices in a manner which is
transparent to those whose personal information is contained therein.
In 1996 two hundred organizations or individuals purchased the Assessment Roll
on microfiche. Most of those were financial institutions, real estate
companies, appraisers and governments.[7] Other purchasers included public
libraries, mortgage corporations, property management companies, septic
services, churches and private citizens.
Bulk Electronic Data
Assessment Roll information is also available on computer disk
or magnetic tape. There are no restrictions on who can purchase this
information in electronic format. As of November, 1996, fourteen organizations
had purchased the Assessment Roll in electronic format. Of the fourteen, ten
were real estate boards, two were utility companies, one was Revenue Canada and
one was a private data corporation, which uses the information to "determine
real estate trends, research previous sales and determine legal
descriptions."[8]
The same restrictions apply to bulk electronic data users as microfiche users,
specifically that the information will not be used for solicitation or mailing
purposes and will not be used to harass members of the public. BC Assessment
does not audit or monitor the uses of the data by bulk electronic data
purchasers.
The MLS Database
Although the MLS database is not open to the public, it warrants some
attention in this report. BC Assessment supplies electronic copies of the
Assessment Roll to the British Columbia Real Estate Association (BCREA)
pursuant to a written reciprocal
data-sharing agreement.
The BCREA states that:
Under this agreement, the BCREA agrees to provide to the Assessment Authority
information on all listings and sales processed through the MLS system. This
allows the Assessment Authority to have up-to-date and accurate information on
property valuations for assessment purposes. The information obtained by the
Association in return is essential for the efficient operation of the real
estate market. It allows members to accurately value properties throughout the
province, obtain comparable tax data, and to confirm ownership before entering
into any listing or other agreement.[9]
BCREA is charged a fee for the database which is calculated by the number of
folios and the number of licensees. Access to the database requires the member
to sign an agreement, which contains restrictions on the use, copying, and
disclosure of the information they access. That agreement specifically
provides that the user will not use, disseminate, copy, or otherwise exploit
the database to or for the benefit of any service bureau, database supplier,
directory publisher, or marketing firm or agency. The members also
specifically agree to refrain from using the information to obtain addresses
for solicitation or mailing purposes, or for use in any manner or for any
purpose which is contrary to the public interest or is otherwise improper.[10]
The BCREA has implemented progressive security guidelines to protect the
integrity and confidentiality of the data it receives. They include: unique
passwords, audit trails, system logs indicating excessive run times, reviews of
unsuccessful access attempts, alarmed secure physical environments and secure
disposal of hard copy media.[11]
Access to the BC Assessment data is restricted to licensed realtors who are
members of BCREA and to fee appraisers who subscribe to MLS services. BC
Assessment requires adherence to data security guidelines, which include unique
userids, log records of each transaction and now bulk downloading of the
information.
BC Assessment has twice permanently revoked the access privileges of licencees
for using the information for solicitation purposes.
Our Office asked BCREA why it was necessary for them to access the name and
address of every property owner, particularly since the name and address do not
factor in the valuation of property, which is the primary objective of the
agreement. BCREA responded that "knowing the names of the individuals in their
trading area allows realtors to better serve the public in real estate
transactions by understanding that community."
The business needs of BCREA must be balanced against the privacy interests of
individual homeowners. At any given point in time, only a fraction of the 1.6
million properties in the province is up for sale. While property owners
selling through MLS consent to the use and disclosure of personal information
in signing an MLS listing agreement, the remaining property owners do not. The
reason the Assessment Roll is created is to assist the public in assessing
taxation equity. The use of the property-related information on the
Roll by the BCREA to value properties is not inconsistent with that purpose.
Having said that, providing full access to the names and addresses of all
homeowners in a given area, (irrespective of whether or not their houses are
for sale) to facilitate a greater "understanding of that community" by a
realtor does not appear to be an appropriate secondary use of the personal
information in the Assessment Roll.
Revenue Generated from the Sale of Information from the Assessment Roll
BC Assessment collectively refers to the various forms of the
Assessment Roll (i.e. microfiche, bulk electronic data etc.) as "products." In
1997, BC Assessment generated approximately $2.3 million in revenue through the
sale of these various products. This includes $1.6 million from BC OnLine
access and $84,000 for sales of the Roll. BC Assessment anticipates that this
amount will reach $3.2 million by the year 2001.[12] BC Assessment is financed primarily through
tax levies (95%) with approximately 4% of overall revenue derived through the
sale of services.[13]
Disclosure of personal information
Section 33 of the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act
describes the only circumstances in which personal information
collected by a public body can be disclosed, either in response to a request,
or in the absence of a request. The disclosure of the names and addresses of
property owners through the Assessment Roll is done through section 33(d),
which states "a public body may disclose personal information only for the
purpose of complying with an enactment of, or with a treaty, arrangement or
agreement made under and enactment of, British Columbia or Canada.
BC Assessment explains:
Section 33(d) permits BC Assessment to disclose this information because such
disclosure is "for the purpose of complying with an enactment." Again the
Assessment Act and the Assessment Authority Act direct names and
addresses of property owners be set out in the Assessment Roll. Given the
terms of these two Acts, there is no room for BC Assessment to exercise
discretion in this area. Therefore s. 33(d) authorizes the disclosure."[14]
Our Office agrees that disclosure of the name and address by making the
Roll available for inspection is required by the Assessment Act and,
hence, permitted under section 33(d) of the Freedom of Information and
Protection of Privacy Act. It remains less clear, however, whether "open
to inspection" can be interpreted broadly enough to include placing the
personal information on the Internet or selling it for secondary purposes to
commercial interests in electronic format.
"Secondary uses" of personal information are disclosure or use of such
information for a purpose other than that for which it was originally
collected. Secondary uses of databases containing personal information are
restricted by section 33(c) of the Freedom of Information and Protection of
Privacy Act. That section permits the secondary disclosure of personal
information for the purpose for which it was obtained or for a "use consistent
with that purpose." Disclosure of personal information for a "consistent
purpose" must meet a two-part test. First, the personal information must have
a "reasonable and direct connection" to the original purpose for which it was
obtained, and the disclosure must be "necessary for performing the statutory
duties of, or for secondly, operating of, a legally authorized program of, the
public body that uses or discloses the information."
It is problematic to suggest that the sale of the entire database is necessary
for the purpose of property comparisons or is a use consistent with the reason
the personal information was collected in the first place. The sale of the
database and/or the ability to download the database from the Internet, for
example, creates problems of secondary usage. Once the information has been
sold, there are very few controls over what happens to the personally
identifiable information contained therein. This is a source of growing public
concern. In the United States, most of the information contained in commercial
information services is derived from public databases, and repackaged in
formats that permit automated searches by name of individual citizens.[15]
The Assessment Roll is prepared on behalf of each local government for
the sole purpose of establishing uniform property values against which
property taxes are levied. The Assessment Roll is divided by taxing
jurisdictions and delivered to each Municipal Treasurer. Information from the
Assessment Roll is used to establish the municipal Property Tax Roll. It is
important to note that property taxes cannot be appealed; only the
property assessment can be appealed.
Section 366 of the Municipal Act requires the municipal collector to
prepare a Property Tax Roll, which may be an extension of the Assessment Roll.
In smaller jurisdictions, the municipal collector and the municipal treasurer
may be the same person; in larger jurisdictions they may be two separate
positions. Section 367 of the Municipal Act requires the collector to
create a property tax Roll using the following information from the Assessment
Roll:
In addition to this, the collector sets out the taxable value of the property,
the combined net taxable value of land and improvements taxed for general
municipal purposes, school taxes, taxes or charges for collection, the amount
of taxes in arrears and delinquent taxes and any other particulars directed by
the council.[16]
For each parcel of land on the Assessment Roll, the collector sends a demand
notice to the assessed owner. The notice contains, among other things, a short
description of the property; the taxes imposed, separately stated; credits
available; other taxes or charges; and dates when penalties will be imposed for
non-payment.
Section 361 of the Municipal Act states "on completion by the
assessor, the Assessment Roll must be open for public inspection without charge
at all convenient hours." As part of this investigation, the Office of the
Information and Privacy Commissioner surveyed 95 municipalities and districts
to determine what information from the Assessment Roll was made available to
the public through their offices and how the public accessed that information.
A sample of those responses:
Survey Summary Local Government Access Mechanisms & Procedures Assessment Roll
The fifty responses that we received revealed a wide variation in what
information was supplied and how it was accessed by the public. This patchwork
quilt of release provisions contributes to uncertainty and confusion among
public bodies entrusted with the management of public records and reinforces
the need for guidelines in this area. We received several comments from
municipalities concerning their confusion over which statute, the Municipal
Act or the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act,
governed the disclosure of property information and how to resolve the
apparent contradiction.
With respect to public access to personal information on the Assessment Roll
at municipal locations, the Union of British Columbia Municipalities stated:
It is our view that in the public version of the Assessment Roll, an entry for
an individual property does not need to display the owner's name or home
address, if the owner's address is other than that of the property in question.
The property address itself, along with related property information such as
the Roll number, legal description, and assessment information such as the
property classification(s), and assessed value of land and improvements, should
be sufficient data for owners trying to compare the value of neighbouring
properties for purposes of an appeal.[17]
We agree that municipalities must continue to receive the Assessment Roll
intact in order to carry out their legislated mandates and to provide services
to taxpayers. We also agree with the position of UBCM that "municipalities
should be vigilant in how information is displayed for public inspection and
cognizant of the need to protect personal privacy whenever possible."[18]
As we have established, the Assessment Roll is provided in a variety of ways
through the Assessment Authority and through local governments. We asked a
number of stakeholders why it is necessary to disclose the name and mailing
address of the property owner to determine whether a property has been
equitably assessed. After all, it is the property that is under scrutiny, not
the homeowner--why, then, should the name be required for comparative purposes?
We also asked why, if the issue of equity only applies to properties within one
taxation jurisdiction (i.e., within the boundaries of the municipality), why
the entire Roll is made available for inspection, and not simply those
properties within the relevant tax boundary?
We received several responses to these questions, which can be divided into
ten general categories.
Names & Address--Required by Legislation
Necessary to accurately identify property
BC Assessment indicates that the Roll is crucial to identifying properties,
especially in rural areas, where parcels of land are generally referred to by
name, (i.e., Old McDonald's Farm) rather than street address. A Roll without
names would make accurate identification of rural properties more difficult.
Legal descriptions and parcel identifier numbers have little practical value in
identifying a parcel of land. BC Assessment states that "loss of the name from
the Roll would jeopardize the ability of potentially hundreds of thousands of
rural property owners in determining whether their assessments are fair. As a
result there would be inequality of treatment for these property owners
vis-à-vis urban property owners who might rely only on addresses."[20]
Property owners compare the value of similar properties, which, in the case of
residential properties, are generally those in the same neighbourhood within
the boundaries of the municipality or district.
This being the case, why are the names and addresses of all
property owners in the entire province made available for public inspection?
Property owners in Saanich would never need to access the name and address of a
homeowner in Kelowna or in Smithers to determine whether their own property in
Saanich had been equitably assessed. Obviously, if someone in Saanich owned
property in Smithers they would require access to the Roll in Smithers, but the
question remains as to the availability of the entire Roll to anyone who wishes
to browse through it. Our office believes the Assessment Act is far too
broad in this respect. In an ideal privacy world, access for the purpose of
property comparison should be limited only to properties within the taxing
jurisdictions in which property is held. This is the case with municipalities
and districts, whose property records are restricted to properties within their
jurisdiction. We do not believe, from a privacy perspective, that the case can
be made for availability of the entire Roll, nor do we believe that the case
can be made that equity and fairness dictate unrestricted access to the entire
Roll.
The BC government is instituting a province-wide 911 emergency call system.
In order for such a system to operate, every property in the province will be
required to possess a street address, which should eliminate the rural property
identification problem. Of interest is the fact that the original plan was to
include the name and address of the occupant/homeowner in the 911 database.
However, as quick responses to 911 calls depend on the address of the
emergency, rather than the name of the afflicted, it was determined that the
system did not require personal information. In response to recommendations
from our Office, the content of the database contains street addresses only.
Necessary for determining tax liability
The Assessment Roll names the property owner. Section 40 of the
Assessment Act allows a person to appeal the name of the property owner,
if "the name of a person has been wrongfully inserted in, or omitted from the
Assessment Roll." BC Assessment states that making ownership information on
the Assessment Roll open for inspection minimizes errors in determining tax
liability by permitting property owners to correct any wrongful inclusion or
omission from the Assessment Roll.[21]
Necessary to understand the Assessment Roll
BC Assessment points out that the Assessment Act enables certain
residential properties to be valued in a manner distinct from the rest of the
neighbourhood. If the owner of such a property has lived in, and owned, the
property for more than 10 years, the property is in a redevelopment area and
the owner applies by the deadline, then the property may be eligible for
valuation taking into account only its current use. An example of this is a
house nestled among office towers where the owner has chosen not to sell to
developers to make way for further office tower expansion. If the owner has
lived there, in a single family dwelling, for the past ten years, then the
property may be assessed based simply on its current residential use without
considering potential alternative uses. Additionally, a number of properties
are entitled to other statutory tax benefits, such as exemptions from taxation.
BC Assessment submits that "removal of the name of the owners in these
situations would make these exemptions or those provisions of the Assessment
Act incomprehensible to the public."[22]
Convenience
Efficiency and Effectiveness
BC Assessment credits the openness of the Assessment Roll to an increase in
public confidence in the property valuation system. From 1993 to 1998 the
total number of appeals to the Courts of Revision has dropped from 49,085 to
28,496, or from 3.5% to 1.8% of all properties valued. [24]
The time frames for filing an appeal have not changed, and citizens have the
right to appeal property assessments delivered by December 31, but only if
the appeal is filed before the following January 31. The Roll is open to
permit the comparison of one property relative to similar properties to assist
homeowners in deciding if their property has been assessed fairly and to assist
them in choosing whether or not to appeal their property assessment. We
believe that making the Roll available for public inspection after the yearly
deadline for filing an appeal has expired is inconsistent with the fair
information principle that personal information should not be made available
for purposes other than those specified. By removing the time limits for
viewing the Roll, the legislature unwittingly increased the chances that
personal information would be accessed by those without a legitimate interest
in the information. BC Assessment responds that individuals taking an appeal
on to the Assessment Appeal Board or defending their assessment when a third
party is appealing may wish to check the assessments of comparable properties,
and these types of situations can occur any time during the tax year.
Scrutiny of property assessments of prominent citizens
The flip side of this argument is that high profile or vulnerable individuals
may be subject to surveillance or harassment through the publication of their
names and property addresses. This is especially so if the data is in
electronic format and is easily searched by name. People who may be vulnerable
include estranged wives of violent husbands; jurors, judges, police officers,
medical doctors, athletes, entertainers, journalists, psychiatrists and
politicians.[26]
In our opinion, the issue of vulnerable people is not insignificant. Women
who are in the process of leaving abusive relationships are vulnerable to
harassment or violence from their partners. Certain occupations such as
transition home workers, physicians, abortion clinic staff, police officers,
and psychiatrists are inherently less safe and the fact that their home
addresses can be tracked down through the public property registries increases
the threat of harassment or violence. BC Assessment has taken proactive steps
to permit the removal of the street addresses of properties of vulnerable
people, where it can be demonstrated that publication would place them at
risk.
To assist in the functions of local government
The Assessment Roll is created for the use of municipalities. It is entirely
appropriate for the information to be used for the purposes described above.
To ensure fairness in province-wide levies
Property values are used to determine province-wide levies, for
example, the BC Assessment Levy and School Taxes. According to BC Assessment,
it is therefore necessary that citizens have rights of access to all
properties on the Roll. Under the Assessment Act, citizens of the
province have the right to appeal any property assessment, regardless of
ownership interests and geographical location. The argument is that, if
province-wide levies are based on the value of all of the properties within BC
and the tax burden shared among those properties, then the entire Roll must be
made available.
The rationale for making the Assessment Roll available on a province-wide
basis is weakened in our view when the appeal statistics are examined. In 1997
there were 1,592 third party property appeals (compared to 21,311 owner/agent
appeals). We are aware that the number of third parties who appeal the
property assessment of a property outside their municipal tax boundary
is a very small percentage of all appeals.
Crucial to businesses who serve the public
The reason the Assessment Roll is open for inspection is to permit comparisons
of similar properties to promote an equitable taxation system. In our view,
the uses of the names and addresses on the Roll for activities such as
canvassing who is living in a neighbourhood for the purpose of developing a
selling plan is an example of "function creep." "Function creep" refers to
secondary uses of a database which are not connected or only vaguely connected
with the original purpose for which the database was created.
With respect to the use of the database by the BCREA, those who choose to list
their properties with a realtor and hence on the MLS Service have consented to
the disclosure of their names and addresses for purposes of selling that home.
We remain unconvinced that the entire list of names and addresses
should be provided to the BCREA in order for realtors to be able to price a
home correctly or conduct market research.
How broadly should the phrase "open to inspection" be interpreted? Does it
include the sale of the entire Assessment Roll or placing property databases on
the Internet which can be downloaded and repackaged? The reason the database
is made public is critical to this analysis. To assist our analysis, we
examined the legislative and public policy history surrounding the Assessment
Roll.
Legislative History
The assessment and tax Rolls in 1957 served more than one purpose. They were
handwritten, and were not available in duplicate. This created practical
problems as the daily tasks of municipal staff who required access to the Roll
were routinely interrupted to permit public viewing of the same Roll. Access
became a legislative requirement to ensure the Roll was available to taxpayers
for at least one month out of the year, without specifying the month. The
practice of making the Roll available the month prior to the appeal deadline
was pragmatic and permitted municipal workers to work on the Roll the remainder
of the year undisturbed while ensuring public access during critical times.[29]
When the Assessment Act was introduced in 1974, section 8 provided
that the Assessment Roll would be "available for inspection during business
hours." Access was no longer restricted to a thirty-day period. Nothing in
the legislative record indicates why this was done; section 8 was approved by
the committee on June 13, 1974 without comment. In 1977, section 52 of the
Assessment Amendment Act, 1977 (No. 2) amended the Municipal
Act to provide for year-round public access to the property Roll. Again,
there are no records regarding the committee's discussion of the amendments.
The issue of public accessibility to property information was addressed in two
reports. The first, The Real Property Tax in British Columbia--An
Analysis, was prepared for the BC School Trustees Association in April,
1972, two years before the Assessment Act was introduced. The report
commented on the taxpayers' poor understanding of how property was assessed and
taxed and their uncertainty as to whether their property was equitably
assessed.[30] The report went on to say that
lack of access to the Assessment Roll was an "obstacle" to the taxpayers'
ability to ensure properties were assessed according to a similar standard.[31] It concluded that taxpayers should be given access to more information about
taxes to improve their understanding and that this access should extend
throughout the year.
The second report, Commission of Inquiry on Property Assessment and
Taxation: Preliminary Report of the Commissioners, was prepared in 1976,
after the introduction of the Assessment Act, but before the access
provision in the Municipal Act was amended. In the mid-1970's, the
McMath Commission was created by Order in Council to look into how property
assessment and taxation in British Columbia could be improved. Although the
Commission was disbanded before it was able to complete its inquiry, it
produced a preliminary report on July 30, 1976. The McMath Commission found
that the public was concerned that "practically no public access to assessment
information" was available, and that they were "unable to obtain information
they need to proceed properly with an appeal."[32]
Plainly, the public policy reason the Roll was made more accessible was to
promote greater awareness and to increase the credibility of the property
assessment system by allowing citizens to compare their assessment with those
of similar properties to determine whether their properties were equitably
assessed.
Absence of a definition
"Open for inspection" is not defined in either the Assessment
Act or the Municipal Act. We conducted a search of all provincial
statutes which contain inspection provisions and found that none defined the
term "open to inspection." However, it is interesting to note that a number of
those Acts specified where records were to be located during business
hours, and many specifically provided a separate right to take copies of the
record under inspection. The frequent requirement that a record be kept in a
particular location so as to be "open to inspection" implies that the public
are expected, in those circumstances, to attend a specific geographical
location in order to inspect the records. This is the current situation with
respect to BC Assessment area offices where members of the public must attend
in person to inspect the Roll.
Section 27 of the Interpretation Act states that "where an enactment
power is given to a person to inspect or to require the production of records,
the power includes power to make copies or extracts of the records." Obviously
then, the power to inspect includes the power to make a copy of whatever is
being inspected.
However, the phrase "open to inspection" is further qualified in the
Assessment Act and the Municipal Act. "Open to inspection" is
permitted "at all convenient hours" and "during regular business hours," which
clearly implies limits to public accessibility. Does the term "open for
inspection" mean unlimited access, at any time, to anyone, for any purpose?
Should access be to a particular record for a particular purpose, or should
access be permitted to the complete collection, for any purpose whatsoever?
It is unlikely the legislature contemplated that "open for inspection" would
eventually include the sale of the entire Roll or placing the property
registries on the Internet where anyone could browse through it and download it
anonymously. The current wording of the Assessment Act and the
Municipal Act does not unambiguously support this either. Roger Clarke
of the Australia National University has commented on the problem of imprecise
language with respect to public registers:
The original purposes for which `public registers' were created were often
implicit rather than being expressed in any official form, and are hence open
to interpretation. In some cases, it has suited the interests of various
parties to presume that the purposes were all-encompassing, and access and use
accordingly completely open. The result has been that considerable function
creep has occurred in respect of some collections (i.e. there are many uses for
purposes that have little to do with the apparent purpose of the database...
this situation was somewhat problematical before information technology
matured; but it is now exacerbated by a range of new capabilities, most
critical of these are greatly enhanced abilities to search data. Collections
that were once searchable using a primary key only (such as the address of a
property or the name of a telephone subscriber), can now be readily trawled, or
to apply the currently fashionable term, `mined.'[33]
The rapid advances of digital technology and the ability for systems to
compile, analyze, and disseminate massive amounts of information, including
personal information, create new problems, since the information is used for
purposes beyond the public policy reason for making it public. Commercial
interests support the easy and quick availability of this information and we do
not dispute the commercial value of public records. We simply make the
statement that public bodies have a duty to safeguard the personal information
of ordinary citizens from misuse and suggest that the current system of data
protection is inadequate for this purpose.
Once a database is rendered "public" by statute or practice, the ability to
control who accesses the information and for what purposes is all but lost,
whether the database is in paper or computerized format. However,
computerization is making it easier to gather, sort and compile the personal
information contained in "public" registries, such as property registries, for
unauthorized or inappropriate purposes. As public agencies continue to
automate databases, the limited privacy protections inherent in earlier manual
paper searches is weakened further. The experience of the City of Victoria
starkly illustrates this point.
The Assessment Roll is made available for public inspection to permit the
comparison of one property assessment to another, to evaluate whether a
property has been equitably assessed. The names of the property owners are
included in the databases primarily to confirm the identification of the
property. In this regard, the personal information of the property owner is
necessary but secondary to the property information.
The Assessment Roll should not, therefore, be searchable by the name of the
property owner, but only by property identifiers. The distinction is
subtle, but critical. If the system were not searchable by name it could not
be used, for example, to run the names of all women working at a particular
transition home, the name of an arresting police officer, a high profile
politician or a doctor who performs abortions to determine where they lived.
However, if you were appealing your property assessment and wished to examine
the value of a home five doors down, the ownership information would be
available, but only if you knew the address of the property.
Where inappropriate usage of the Assessment Roll cannot be controlled, it
should be discouraged. The reason why the Assessment Roll is made public
should be stated, either in legislation or in a policy statement, and clearly
communicated to those wishing to search to database. Furthermore, such
statements should define unrelated or incompatible uses of the personal
information.
Obviously, information from the Assessment Roll must be used in the
conveyancing of properties and in the mortgage and insurance businesses. Such
transactions require confirmation of property values. Accessing this
information, on a case-by-case basis, is an appropriate use of the information.
Providing the Roll to municipalities is necessary for them to carry out their
civic mandates in accordance with the law. These are all appropriate uses of
the Assessment Roll and consistent with the purpose for which it was created.
The critical point is that personal information in the property registries
should be accessed by the public and by businesses on a case-by-case
basis. Access to the name and property address of the property owner should be
limited to targeted uses consistent with the original purpose for which it was
collected. One of the fundamental principles this Office promotes under the
Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act is that the
right information needs to reach the right person at the right time for the
right purpose. The bulk sale of the Assessment Roll and the personal
information contained therein is incompatible with the principle of targeted
access and use of the information on a case-by-case basis. Access to the
personal information in the database should be limited to a particular record,
and not to the complete collection.
In the interests of finding an appropriate balance between the need for
disclosure of the names and addresses of property owners for certain
transactions and the right of citizens to control the primary and secondary
uses of their personal information, we make the following recommendations:
Recommendations
Recommendation #1
Recommendation #2
Recommendation #3
Recommendation #4
This report was written by Mary Carlson and researched by Mary Carlson,
Maureen Meikle and Karen O'Reilly. The Office of the Information and Privacy
Commissioner would like to thank all those who participated in this
investigation and contributed to the content of this report. We would like to
thank Tom Johnstone, Daryl Hayward, Bill Headon, Richard Bridge, Catherine
McDonald, Richard Bridge, Doug Rundell and Elise Chan, BC Assessment Authority;
Bob Dearborn and Tony Roy, BC OnLine; Ellie Jansen, Ministry of Municipal
Affairs and Housing; Robin Hill and Keith Mitchell, BC Real Estate Association;
Richard Taylor, Union of BC Municipalities; Rob Bennett, Ministry of Finance
and Corporate Relations; Kelly Bert Manning, David Loukidelis, Lidstone, Young
Anderson; Jim Burrows, City of Victoria; George Murray, District of Chilliwack;
T.R. Kirk, Corporation of the District of Saanich; Sheila Callen, City of
Surrey; Carolyn Kassam, City of Nanaimo; Pamela Hilchie, District of North
Saanich; Toireasa Strong, City of Abbotsford; Paul Douville, City of Duncan;
Mark Hiltz, District of Sechelt; Kathy Young, District of Lillooet; Robert
Seright, Township of Esquimalt; G.A. Wiley, City of Port Alberni; William
Lindsay, District of Invermere; Barry Gagnon, City of Armstrong; Sherry Miller,
City of Kelowna; W. Organ, City of Cranbrook; Maureen Murray, City of Quesnel;
Mrs. D. Pelletier, City of Courtenay; Jamie Forbes, City of Trail; Jim Chute,
City of Dawson Creek; Sylvia Jagpal, District of Pitt Meadows; Tom MacDonald,
District of Oak Bay; Doug Fleming, District of Logan Lake; Bruce Woodbury,
District of Highlands; Eric McMurran, District of Hope; Mary Geall, District of
Sicamous; Doug Thomas, City of Langley; Margot MacFadyen, City of North
Vancouver; Audrey Welk, City of Kimberly; Bill Beamish, District of Houston;
Karl D. Preuss, City of Revelstoke; Tina Neurauter, City of Colwood; Jack
Richardson, City of Rossland; Joyce E. Fraser, District of 100 Mile House; Mrs.
S. Carmen, District of Powell River; Norma Everett, District of Tumbler Ridge;
Judy Kovacs, City of Coquitlam; Sandy Hansen, District of Sparwood; Denise
Fisher, City of Terrace; D.M. Dediuk, City of Kamloops; Lorraine Bendle,
District of Elkford; Linda Chuddy, District of MacKenzie; Susan Rauh, City of
Port Coquitlam; District of Tofino; Sue Englund, City of Williams Lake; Marla
Olsen, City of Nelson; Ronald Marriot, Corporation of the District of
Peachland; Brenda Sims, Resort Municipality of Whistler; Cerise Elliot,
District of Lake Country; Fay Lavallee District of Hudson's Hope; and Celia
Francis, Kyle Friesen, Pam Smith, Lorrainne Dixon, Bill Trott, Sharon Plater,
Mark Grady, Jim Sereda, Ralph Sketchley and Peter Luttmer of the Office of the
Information and Privacy Commissioner.
2 "Privacy and Public Registers", Roger Clarke, address to the IIR Conference
on Data Protection and Privacy, Boulevard Hotel, Sydney, May 1997.
3 In the Balance: Toward a Model for Public Stewardship of Electronic
Government Records, Final Report of the Governor's Work Group on Commercial
Access to Government Electronic Records, November 1996, Washington State
Department of Information Services, page 14-15.
4 Submission of BC Assessment, December 5, 1996, page 10.
5 Bartalk Newsletter of the Canadian Bar Association, Vol. 9, No. 5 October
1997.
6 Supplementary submission of BC Assessment, February 7, 1997, page 3.
7 Supplementary submission of BC Assessment, February 7, 1997, attachment
8 Supplementary submission of BC Assessment, February 7, 1997, page 3.
9 Submission of the BC Real Estate Association, November 5, 1996, page 2.
10 Submission fro the British Columbia Real Estate Association, November 5,
1996, page 3.
11 Submission of the BCREA, November 5, 1996, attachments.
12 BC Assessment Submission, December 5, 1996, page 10.
13 The Assessment Answer Book, BC Assessment Authority, 1995 page
5-1.
14 Submission of BC Assessment, December 5, 1996, page 9.
15 In the Balance: Toward a Model for Public Stewardship of Electronic
Government Records, Final Report on the Governor's Work Group on Commercial
Access to Government Electronic Records, Nov. 1996, Washington State Dept. of
Information Services, pp. 17-19
16 Municipal Act, section 426
17 Submission of UBCM, November 21, 1996, page 1.
18 Submission of UBCM, November 21, 1996, page 4.
19 Submission of BC Assessment, December 5, 1996, page 10.
20 Submission of BC Assessment, December 5, 1996, page 11.
21 Submission of BC Assessment, December 5, 1996, Page 12.
22 Submission of BC Assessment, December 5, 1996, page 10.
23 Submission of Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing, December 23,
1996 Page 2
24 Assessment Newsletter, May 1996 and BC Assessment Court of Revision
Statistics
25 Submission of Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing, December 23,
1996 page 3
26 Ibid. cite 2 page 7.
27 Submission of the UBCM, November 21, 1996, page 2.
28 Submission of the BCREA, June 3, 1997, page 3.
29 Interview with Mr. Bill Headon, (former Deputy Assessment Commissioner,
Support Services, BC Assessment Authority) , June 1997
30 The Real Property Tax In British Columbia--Analysis--Research Report
Prepared for the BC School Trustees Association, Philip H. White and
Stanley W. Hamilton, Faculty of Commerce and Business Administration,
University of British Columbia, p. 29.
31 Cite 15, p. 35.
4. The Municipal Property Tax Roll
5. How does Publication of the Name and Address Ensure Taxation Fairness?
BC Assessment correctly states that the regulations under the Assessment
Act specify what information is to be contained on the Assessment Roll.
The regulations require that the name and address of the property owner be
included on the Roll.
The Rolls are open to the public to permit comparisons of property values. BC
Assessment states that if one neighbour wishes to compare his/her property to
another, that search is generally conducted by name, and if the search is
conducted by property address, the name confirms that the property identified
is the correct one.[19] From a privacy
perspective, it is significant to note that hard copies of the Assessment Roll
cannot be searched by name, but by address only.
BC Assessment states that the name must be included on the Assessment Roll for
the purpose of determining who is liable for property taxes. The property
owner is liable for the property taxes, and subject to penalties for
non-payment. The amount of property taxes cannot be appealed; only the
property assessment can be appealed.
Not all properties are subject to taxation; some are exempt by virtue of
ownership. For example, properties which are owned by schools, churches and
charities may be subject to a different taxation scheme than neighbouring
properties.
According to BC Assessment, having the names on the Assessment Roll makes it
much more convenient for the public to compare property values. BC Assessment
reports that between early January (when assessment notices are received by
property owners) and January 31, 1998 (the deadline for filing appeals) they
received just over 7,000 office visits from people questioning their
assessments and examining the Roll.
The Ministry of Municipal Affairs stated that another reason for making the
system open is it will reduce the number of property assessment appeals, as
property owners will have better information on which to make decisions whether
to appeal an assessment. It states that this promotes efficiencies in the
system. [23]
Another reason given for the transparency of the system is that the public
should be able to verify if property owned by certain classes of people, for
example assessors or politicians, are valued on the same basis as other
comparable properties.[25]
The Union of British Columbia Municipalities (UBCM) correctly
points out that the information supplied to the municipalities by BC Assessment
is done for the mandated purpose of levying and collecting local taxes, fees
and licences, and for the fulfillment of other legislated functions such as tax
sales, business licensing, bylaw enforcement, and public safety services.[27] UBCM states "Given the property-oriented
nature of the local government system, all these functions are dependent on the
local government's property database for their operation, and require that the
property owner be readily identifiable to local government staff, for safety,
financial liability, or public participation reasons."
The BC Real Estate Association takes the general position that "access to
comprehensive public databases is crucial to businesses who serve the public.
Competition in a global marketplace requires access to data that will serve a
consumer's need to know what is available on a public database, and who they
are dealing with in a transaction. Limiting the ability of a consumer's agent
to have secured access to a publicly funded database is a denial of the
consumer's right." Specifically, the BCREA states that the name on the Roll is
"crucial for sale of properties in rural areas" and that "full access to public
data has reduced the cost of property transactions, helped to eliminate fraud,
and significantly reduced the time it takes to participate in real property
ownership."[28] Furthermore, BCREA states that
the names and addresses permit realtors to "better serve the public in real
estate transactions by understanding that community."
6. "Open to Inspection"--A Broad or Narrow Interpretation?
Residents of this province were first given the legislative right to access
the Assessment Rolls in 1957 through section 347 of the Municipal Act,
S.B.C. 1957, c. 42. Unfortunately, historical documentation is sparse as to
why access was provided for in that Act. Hansard reports do not exist for
1957.
Conclusions and Recommendations
The public should only be able to search real property registries,
whether in paper or electronic format, by the address of the
property.
Registry users should be clearly informed of the legitimate purposes
for which property registries may be inspected, including prohibitions and
limitations on unrelated uses, such as the compilation of mailing lists.
In the case of bulk sales of property registry data, whether in electronic,
microfiche or hard copy format, the name of the property owner should be
suppressed.
Where an individual has reasonable grounds to believe that disclosure
of their personal information would jeopardize their safety, or that of their
family, and they provide an alternate mailing address, BC Assessment should
amend the Assessment Roll to make this substitution.
Footnotes
1 "Cybersnoops know where you live" Vancouver Sun October 7, 1996.