City Council Meeting Tuesday
9e) There is an order by Councilor Haller looking to convert non-owner occupied dwellings to the commercial rate.
That would mean that a three decker that does not have an owner-occupant would then see their taxes doube (12.10 per thousand to 25.32 per thousand). Obviously I am a landlord of non-owner occupied dwellings and am biased against this, but let me ask you this what do you think I will do if this passes? I would most likely go up on my rent.
Putting that aside if you have two identical three deckers side by side, why should one pay double the taxes. I know the arguement that owner-occupied houses stabilize a neighborhood, but I have had some tenants ten years and they stabilize a neighborhood as much as any owner-occupied house.
9f) There is another order by Councilor Haller looking to charge a "user fee" for city employees who do not reside in the City of Worcester.
I agree that we should encourage people to live in the City of Worcester, but should we penalize people who do not want to live in the City of Worcester? I whole-heartedly disagree with this order also. Rather then penalize city employees, who do not reside in the City of Worcester, lets pick targeted areas and encourage city employees to live here by offering a rebate on their taxes?
Lastly how would the City of Worcester enforce either of these orders? More importantly the last thing we need to do is pit owner-occupied dwellings versus owner-occupied dwellings, it is bad enough that we already have commercial and residential dual rates.
Bill
posted by Bill Randell @ 1:34 PM
4 comments
4 Comments:
What's the matter with Haller. She really hates the businesspeople in her district, and you wonder why there's no jobs. Let's double the taxes for investment property owners, that makes sense.
This all political posturing on her part.
Does anyone really think she wants to double real estate taxes for the entities that hold non owner occupied real estate, which entities her domestic partner is allegedly manager and/or beneficiary of and which entities are now and have been in the past way behind in their tax payments to the city?
I would rather see steeply increased taxes for un-occupied real estate, be it residential or commercial. I hate seeing those lucky enough to afford property in the city who just let their properties deteriorate. The buildings are eyesores, hurt the property values and economic development around them, and are a real hazard for fire and crime. And their taxes are subsequently lower because the value of the crappy property is lower. If taxes went up, there would be a real incentive for rental, upkeep, or re-selling it to someone that would actually take care of it. An occupied building is a happy building.
Shannon:
Great job with your appeal. You bring up a great point and I had looked into in the past, but there was a legal issue that would not enable a separate tax class for empty buildings.
There are two things you can do. First these empty properties fall off the map. The assesors office should make a concerted effort to revalue these empty properties at the correct value.
Secondly, we have an abandoned building ordinance that is not enforced as well as it should. Specifically there is a requirement of abandoned buildings to have something like $1,000,000 of liability insurance which they must prove is in force each year to the City of Worcester. This costs $$$$ and would maybe force these abandoned owners of buildings to either fix or sell.
Bottom line you make a great point, but we can not do exactly what you ask. We can, however, put pressure on the owners of these buildings.
Bill Randell
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