Are Qualicum Beach residents paying more than their share of hospital taxes?
- 22 hours ago
- 4 min read
Residents within the Regional District of Nanaimo (RDN) will be seeing a 21% increase in Hospital taxes this July on their municipal property tax bills this summer. Further the RDN's plan is to continue 21% increases on a compounded basis for the next 3 years.
Proponents of the tax hike (including Mayor Westbroek )spoke of the need for more healthcare and to ensure future tax payers are not saddled with high debt repayment, as costs are likely to escalate by the time this project ultimately gets built. At this point in time the province has accepted the RDN's offer to anti up our share of the funding now to help the various improvement projects move along a very long time line. This includes firstly a concept plan, a business plan, followed by design, cost estimates and ultimately construction.
Several directors objected to the Hospital Boards approach of high immediate taxation to build reserves to achieve our 40% portion of the funding, when there is no confidence that the province will have the necessary funds to meet their share of the costs (60%) any time soon. Leanne Salter Electoral Area Coombs director spoke of residents moving from the area as they can no longer afford to live here. Lantzville Mayor Swain, drew attention to the "gross disparity" in amounts each community will need to pay.
Are we paying more than our fair share?
Comparing the data across the province is difficult as hospital funding formulas vary significantly. For example Vancouver, Surrey and Pitt Meadows do not report hospital taxes separately.( Their fees are combined with transit and other costs.) The province also does not collect data on hospital taxes paid by individual electoral areas within in regional districts. Currently hospital taxes are based on assessed values of properties and not based on a function of area population.
Based on data collected from BC government website, we are indeed paying considerable sums compared to other municipalities. Hospital tax rates per average house value shows that all four municipalities in the RDN are among the top ten highest taxed municipalities in the province.
Municipalities | Hospital tax per average house value | |||
(Top 10) | 2024 | 2025 | ||
Lantzville | $515 | $626 | ||
Sun Peaks | $467 | $473 | ||
Qualicum Beach | $460 | $564 | ||
Vanderhoof | $380 | $379 | ||
Parksville | $354 | $429 | ||
Prince George | $335 | $344 | ||
Fernie | $330 | $372 | ||
Nanaimo | $319 | $425 | ||
North Cowichan | $281 | $290 | ||
Burns Lake | $279 | $298 | ||
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For perspective, across the province the average annual amount of hospital tax paid is $143. With the approved 21% tax increase, Qualicum Beach residents with an average home can expect to pay hospital tax of approximately $640. on their 2026 tax bill.
Given Mayor Swain's comment about "gross disparity" I thought it would be interesting to also compare costs based on population for the 4 municipalities within the RDN, and just a few other municipalities.
Chart #2
| Population | Total Hospital Taxes | Cost per Person |
Lantzville | 4,210 | $1,160,251 | $275.59 |
Qualicum Beach | 9,363 | $2,776,310 | $296.52 |
Parksville | 14,995 | $3,761,372 | $250.84 |
Nanaimo | 110,707 | $20,994,799 | $189.64 |
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Port Alberni | 19,685 | $684,958 | $34.80 |
Sun Peaks | 1,561 | $543,623 | $348.25 |
Ladysmith | 9,903 | $1,285,113 | $129.77 |
Campbell River | 38,028 | $3,225,332 | $84.81 |
The population numbers in chart #2 are taken from the BC government website and are recorded as "BC stats estimated population for 2024." The 2025 hospital taxes are taken from BC government website . | |||
It appears that Nanaimo has always paid considerably less by population than the other municipalities with in the RDN. It is not clear why this is the case other than Nanaimo has a far greater number of both small rental units and condos versus single family homes. The argument may also be that they have far more families than Qualicum Beach and Parksville might have. Lantzville clearly is paying more per person and Sun Peaks also has a high cost per capita. Sun Peaks a resort town may need more medical facilities due to the high influx of seasonal skiers. What is not clear is why are both Port Alberni and Campbell River who both have full functioning hospitals are paying so little in hospital taxes.
The disparity in costs arises from the downloading of hospital infrastructure and equipment capital costs from the province to the regional districts. Not only do we have unfair distribution in access to healthcare services ( a provincial responsibility) but we now have unfair taxation to fund those services. It is high time for our elected officials both municipal and regional to start advocating with the provincial government on our behalf, for greater hospital taxation fairness.
As the RDN considers amending the the number of directors given the RDN's population growth, this is a perfect opportunity to also explore the feasibility of splitting the RDN into two. The City of Nanaimo has such dominance that fairness in cost distribution ( hospital and other assessment based taxes) continues to be a challenge when the Nanaimo directors alone, can out vote all the other area directors. This problem will not go away without significant reform at the regional district level.
Marie Noel
April 7 2026
We welcome your comments and feedback.
You can email us at Qualicumbeachinsights@gmail.com
More info
Link to the RDN board meeting March 24 2026
