Rama won't raise real property tax

CEBU, Philippines - Despite the report from the Bureau of Local Government-Finance (BLGF) that Cebu City ranks only eleventh among 16 cities in Central Visayas in terms of real property tax collection, Mayor Michael Rama still does not want to increase taxes.

Rama said he may agree to increase the tax rates in Cebu City particularly on lands, buildings and machineries, only if the people themselves would request for it.

The Local Government Code allows general revision of real property taxes every three years but the mayor's trusted assistant, Jose Daluz III, explained that Rama sees no need to raise taxes if the Cebu City Council will allow the sale of lots at the South Road Properties.

One of the city's major problems particularly when there's a heavy downpour is the flooding. City Engineer Kenneth Carmelita Enriquez said it needs P2.6 Billion to solve the problem.

According to the BLGF, the real property tax is considered the lifeblood of the local government units (LGU) but Cebu City failed to meet with its target collections every year for the past three years.

Although Cebu City has the highest amount of real property tax collections of all the cities in the region amounting to P1.959 Billion from 2010, 2011 and 2012, its performance is low because it did not meet its targets.

In 2010, the City Treasurer's Office gave a real property tax collection target of P727.1 million but what was realized was only P616 million. The following year, the City Treasurer's Office again gave a target collection of P781.6 million, but only collected P670.4 million.

The City again gave an estimate of P825.5 million in real property taxes in 2012, but the actual amount collected was only P672.3 million. Real properties include lands, buildings and machineries.

The records of the BLGF showed that the city's tax collectors did not meet targetted revenues from real property taxes that is why the city only landed in 11th place in 2010, 13th in 2011 and again 11th rank as of last year.

Rama wants to intensify revalidation of properties to increase revenues because owners of properties have their lands classified as residential but in reality are using the lands for commercial.  – (FREEMAN)