The City of Saskatoon is looking for the best incentives to bring more businesses to Saskatoon and the University of Saskatchewan is going to help them with that through their partnership called Research Junction.  The business tax incentive project is just one of many funded through the partnership, including how to better predict slope failures along the river and increasing public safety downtown.

Dr. Haizhen Mou  is a professor at the Johnson-Shoyama Graduate School of Public Policy and she says there are three layers to their research. The first, is comparing Saskatoon’s business property tax rate with other Canadian cities, then working on economic modelling to see how any incentives would affect employment, job growth and who benefits and who doesn’t.

The third step is consultations with economic development agencies, for example, The Chamber, to see what current businesses would advocate for.
Mou gives the examples of a property tax abatement for firms that relocate to Saskatoon and incentives for businesses that take over vacant lots downtown or in the city’s older neighbourhoods.