Assessor: Lower budget means lower income

CEBU, Philippines - Cebu City Acting Assessor Eustaquio Cesa is afraid the city may not be able to collect the P5.2 billion revenues to support this year’s approved annual budget because they could not conduct an intensified tax mapping and revalidation of real property units.

Cesa and Assistant Assessor Liezel Gonzaga said they suggested for the hiring of at least 90 job order employees to revalidate the 218,000 real property units in the city to increase revenues, but the City Council approved P8 million out of their P24 million proposal.

Gonzaga said the City would be spending P9 million for the whole year’s salaries of the 90 job order employees, including the cost of equipment like laptops, aside from the cost to train them for their tasks.

The assessor’s office only has 12 personnel assigned to conduct tax mapping and revalidation of land, buildings and machineries to determine whether the real property units (RPU) are still within the classification based on their tax documents.

Cesa and Gonzaga explained that there are several houses and residential buildings classified as residential in City Hall records although these were converted for commercial purposes.

It was proven that the tax mapping and revalidation of RPUs helped increase the assessed value of properties, this is why the Assessor’s Office was able to raise the tax value of several reassessed RPUs from P16,314,396 to P82,040,482.

The new tax assessment of real properties in barangay Kamputhaw and Capitol Site, and parts of barangay Apas, Lahug, Guadalupe, Sta. Cruz and Cogon-Central can already be implemented this year.

Cesa said his personnel also started a reassessment of tax values of the land, buildings and machineries in some parts of barangay Mabolo and Kasambagan.

Meanwhile, during the reassessment and revalidation there were 410 RPUs that were discovered underclared, although the Office of the Building Officials (OBO) had already issued occupancy permits to all of them.

It prompted Cesa to request OBO Acting head Josefa Ylanan not to issue occupancy permits to newly constructed buildings without tax declaration from the City Assessor’s Office. (FREEMAN)