The Tribune

By NATARIO McKENZIE

Tribune Business Reporter

nmckenzie@tribunemedia.net

THE Government’s will move to “beef up” enforcement of real property tax (RPT) collections once the existing amnesty programme finishes at end-June 2013, a Cabinet Minister saying it had generated interest among property owners.

Michael Halkitis, minister of state for finance, said: “We see some numbers coming in, some people coming in who are interested. It goes until June 30. People who have not been registered will have the opportunity to register.

“We have had some interest, and maybe at the end of the month we would be able to give an update on the actual numbers. When that is done, we want to beef up our enforcement to ensure that those who should be payers are paying.”

He added: “In conjunction with that we are doing a programme where people who think that they are aggrieved, their bills are too high, we have in place now an appeals tribunal where they can take their complaints, other than going to the office to complain.

“We will have a programme where persons whose bill has been increased dramatically can have a hearing.”

The four strands of the real property tax (RPT) amnesty programme are:

• To encourage self-registration of residential properties valued at more than the $250,000 exemption threshold, and commercial properties that had never received a real property tax bill, those who register with the Chief Valuation Officer by June 30, 2013, will not be charged any back taxes.
• To ensure registered property owners who were in arrears became current, the Government will waive 50 per cent of the sum owed - assessment and surcharges - by those who are three years or less behind if payment is made by end-June 2013.
• For those who are more than three years in arrears on their real property tax payments, the Government will waive 100 per cent of the penalty charge only if payment is made by December 31, 2013.
• Apart from the 5 per cent rebate for residential homeowners who are current, the Government is also moving to tackle complaints about people receiving increased billings of between 200-500 per cent.

Mr Halkitis said the Government was in the process of finalising its 2013-2014 Budget, noting that it has been challenging trying to ensure it fulfills its commitments.

“We have been sitting down with the  various government agencies, getting their submissions, going through them and making sure that we are in a position to provide them with the resources to fund their proprieties,” Mr Halkitis said.

“We have had some good exchanges. We think we would be able to come in with a goodBudget to ensure that all of our critical agencies - social services, education and security forces - have the resources they need.

“Coming out of the last Budget where we had a lot of commitments carried over, we are going to be through with this and can begin some of this administration’s priorities.”.

Mr Halkitis added: “We expect to present it around the last Wednesday in May for the debate to start about a week after. It’s been a challenging year, trying to make sure we fulfill our commitments. We’re still in a sort of challenging environment, but we have about two months left in this year, so we are doing our best to stay in the parameters we had set.

“In the Mid-Term Budget we put in place a medium-term strategy where over a number of years  we would begin to reverse the growth, and the deficits and the debt. We will be sitting down with the last of the agencies over the next few days, get the drafts together, then it goes through the whole process of being approved and debated in the House.”