Small businesses in Saskatchewan are looking for relief from rising operating costs.

As it stands right now, 84 percent of small business owners in the province say the consistent rise in property taxes is taking its toll.

Jennifer Henshaw is a Senior Policy Analyst with the Canadian Federation of Independent Business.

She said many other factors already make running a small business difficult enough.

“Small business owners are indeed dealing with a number of cost pressures, the costly federal carbon tax, five years of CBP increases and on-going agriculture trade uncertainty, we really need municipalities to commit to holding the line in our property taxes to give Saskatchewan’s job creators that much needed certainty and relief,” Henshaw said.

Henshaw also said they believe that because of the announcement of increased revenue sharing from the province, not increasing property taxes is possible in 2021 for many municipalities across Saskatchewan.

“With the Premier’s announcement recently on revenue sharing funding, we are urging Saskatchewan municipalities to use that funding prudently to avoid those property tax increases in 2021,” she said.

“In 2019/2020 the City of Estevan did not increase their property taxes, other municipalities should follow their lead,” Hensahw said.