Heard in the Hall

How much of a "slowing" of the wage tax cuts are we talking about? We depend on the press to report numbers. Marcia Gelbert didn't put the amount of the proposed change either in her coverage today.

What was the proposed amount of the cut, and what is the new amount of the wage tax cut being offered today?

How do you expect us to write emails to city hall if we simply don't have the data? This is one of the most pressing issues facing the city -- the jobs created by a wage tax abolition, and the press writes a three sentence coverage of it in the Ink.

The potential revenue of taxing the income of valet parkers is miniscule compared to what the city could do that other cities do as a matter of daily operations:

1. Collect the overdue property taxes of $494 million on 113,000 overdue properties at once (www.hallwatch.org/proptax/about/redelinq/stats/summary)

2. Pass Full Market Value Assessment this year. There is no need to wait any longer if Council simply makes the provisions revenue neutral by changing the millage accordingly. However, the Fumo Mansions will get snagged as hugely undervalued and those "oversights" from "lost files" will be automatically corrected by the new software. Net result -- more property tax revenue.

3. Foreclose on all debt owed the city over a certain amount. Water bills, gas bills, taxes, nuisance fines, all this debt owed the city has to be sent to auction for payment. There is no such thing as "bad" debt when that debt is posted against real property. Every other city, county, and state knows this, and acts accordingly. $161 million in unpaid water bills is debt primarily against vacant properties anyway. Sell the properties to the highest bidder, and ALL the debt -- water, gas, taxes, fines -- is paid off at closing from the remainder of the sale price that goes to the old owner.

More journalists have to attend real estate closings or interview abstractors who set up real estate closings on city properties. Everyone who has bought or sold properties knows that liens or debts against a property are paid when the property changes hands. City policy of holding property for decades is costing the city money it needs now.

Taxing valets is just one more doomed attempt to avoid the tough work of collecting the real debt that the city is already legally owed.

When is Council going to treat the city's interest above the cheap votes gained from a constituency that has been trained to think it can live without paying its bills?

How about this for revenue:

Don't let the RDA pay zero in property taxes on properties it holds. That is just allowing blight to accumulate that the RDA hoards.

Property hoarding by city agencies has to have a price, and that price is the cost of the footprint of each property to contribute to the expense of each properties' footprint. Infrastructure, sanitation, streets dept. costs, and a fair share toward each year's school budget is part of what the property taxes pay for.

We can't afford so many low performing government and nonprofit entities who pay nothing to the cost of their own footprint.

That would get the city tens of millions more in property tax revenue, and force the RDA and other nonprofit or government agencies to act promptly to reduce their tax liability. Taxing all property in the city is more effective than even an NTI style program in reducing blight and turning vacant lots around.

There is NO reason to have ANY wage tax at all, except that the Dem City Cttee will not give up having the city, the RDA, and other agencies hoard properties that it does almost nothing with.

The city should get out of the real estate development business. Even if Obama gets elected, he especially will not be able to continue the housing and development block grant waste, fraud, and abuse of the past.

As long as Council is dominated by members who want the whole city to be Cuba, where the government or a government funded nonprofit owns most of the property, and where voters can have "addresses" in property that is controlled by the people they are electing, you are going to have a weak private market, that can't fund good schools.

We have to allow the city owned vacant lots and properties to go back in the hands of private owners -- that property tax is how we pay for schools, and it's the only way (with casinos) we're going to abolish the job-killing BPT, wage tax, and gross receipts tax.

Create jobs, indeed. Do it by shrinking government, contracting out for services (ambulances for example), and growing a tax base that pays for schools, safety, and sanitation.

It's not rocket science people. The city can't be the federal government. We can't be the cradle to grave social worker for all our residents. Those who need jobs might just have to move away to find them, and that's OK, because there are people who want to move here who are qualified for the jobs that are here. Stop trying to force the poor to stay in place -- urban, violent areas are not incubators for people.

Forcing stasis imposed by government in lieu of a self-correcting market is never the answer. Ask the USSR.

What is the city protecting by holding onto so much property? The top five property tax delinquents are a result of city policy or inaction:

www.hallwatch.org/proptax/about/redelinq/stats/topdelinquents/mailingaddress

Just tally up all the city property owned by the city that pays nothing for schools and services in the Top 100 Property Tax Scofflaw list, and you see that the city is the top property tax delinquent.

Why tax valets for a few hundred thousand, when this property could be SOLD. Then, after a new owner owns it, that new owner PAYS PROPERTY TAXES.

Come on folks. No large US city tolerates our would imagine it useful to have the city own so much property that pays nothing in real time now, when schools need that money, when police need that money.

The time to raise the money is now, and that action is to get the city to unload this massive blighted property backlog from when property here was worth nothing.

All property in Philly has value. But the city is killing values and equity in neighborhoods because it wants to hold property for itself.

Why? What possible reason could there be for the city and the RDA to hold so much property out of the hands of those who would pay taxes?

We live in a society where private property is the cornerstone. Private property owners pay for schools and for the salaries of the very officials elected.

Why try to strangle, to prevent private ownership? Someone needs to explain to me why Philly Dems think this accomplishes anything but deficit and blight?

Thanks for posting that. I didn't save my clipping of the article when you first published in when news of the budget came out.

I completely, vehemently disagree with the slowing of the wage tax cuts. Nutter promised to ACCELERATE the wage tax cuts.

This is complete utter BS. I'm disappointed and disgusted with the new mayor and with council.

The top 100 property tax scofflaws owe $56,137,665.50 for 3,328 properties. Why not simply expedite the sheriff sale of these properties?

Once these properties are in the hands of new owners, you'll have tens of millions in new tax revenue per year coming in.

No matter how much of a socialist one may want to be, you can't argue with that.

Let's do the most obvious solutions first -- don't tax working people, tax what is already policy, just make sure that it's in the pipeline of active payors.

Why the press will go on and on about PPA paying $8 million vs. $10 million, and have days of articles on that, but is completely silent on the city not collecting property taxes, and not putting properties back in the pipeline, is a mystery.

This property could contribute. There has to be a balance. We can't have every city property going to house the homeless when we actually need the cash to create jobs to prevent homelessness.

Are we going to be an incubator of jobs, or an incubator of poverty?

What do Greenlee and Blackwell have to say about collecting overdue property taxes in lieu of slowing wage tax cuts?

I'd be interested to know, but the press seems completely uninterested in asking the obvious.

I'm disappointed at the slowing of the wage tax reductions... although I hadn't realized so little of the current reduction schedule was supposed to come from casino revenue. However, since both sides of the BPT are finally supposed to go down, I'm willing to let it slide. At least I am for a year or so, I expect reductions to accelerate (or city services to get very much better) as more "Innovation Philadelphia"s and "Safe and Sound"s get removed from the budget.

Why is all of City Council and the press completely uninterested in the possibility that collecting overdue property tax aggressively (instead of taxing valets) is the answer to ABOLISHING the wage tax, and letting Philly business come back? I suspect that $494 million will go a long way to covering the revenue from the wage tax.

What is the wage tax annual revenue? I'd be interested to know that obvious question, but I rarely see it reported.

This issue is the answer -- bring in jobs, pay for good schools you actually want to send your kids to, have streets that are not drug infested war zones -- we just have to have a press that is willing to speak in numbers and make connections.

It's almost like the press is afraid to report what the annual wage tax revenue is, and what the amount of uncollected overdue property tax is.

Is this such a risky discussion? Why?

It's like the wage tax came about in order to allow the city to selectively collect or not collect property taxes.

Why are property taxes ignored, and wage taxes still the preferred vehicle? What does each member of city council think about this? Why is the press so mum? You foreclose on this property; the sheriff writes the city a check.

There is no more effective way to get money for Nutter's priorities. Why would the city controller be so absent in the discussion? Why would the press be so unwilling to pursue debts owed the city, but will cover future taxes that could be levied?

Doesn't it seem bizarre that council is like "HEY, let's TAX NEW STUFF" instead of saying "we need to make sure we're doing a thorough fair job of uniformly collecting and assessing taxes that are already in place"?

It seems really bizarre to me, and even more bizarre that the press has an absolute zero interest in the numbers. The story is in the numbers.

According to the Budget in Brief (linked to on the front page of phila.gov), the wage tax is supposed to provide a little over $1.2 billion per year. $500 million might reduce the wage tax by about half for one year...

According to the Budget in Brief (linked to on the front page of phila.gov), the wage tax is supposed to provide a little over $1.2 billion per year. $500 million might reduce the wage tax by about half for one year...

The story is the numbers: $494 million in unpaid property taxes, and of property taxes not paid for TEN YEARS OR MORE that total owed the city is some $275 MILLION means that those who OWE MONEY should pay so that the rest of us don't have to pay bizarre taxes like the wage tax.

No valet can cover this shortfall. No reduction in wage tax reduction can compensate. There's no more excuses, no more time, and no way the press can not take a position.

We are going to have to collect property taxes in full and on time like everyone else. Why does this upset the press so much that they are completely silent?

Sometimes two courses of action that are neither of them perfect must be decided. Being silent is not the right answer. Delaying the obvious is not the responsible, adult course.

We're grown ups, right? So choose. Wage tax reductions in increments is really just wage tax continuation. Not writing about property tax collection and what the wage tax brings in is just denial, enabling, avoidance.

Pick which path is the most fair, the most correct, and the best. Which is a levy already decided to be an appropriate burden, which has the potential to drive away jobs for everyone?

If your answer is silence, that's not the writer's response.

That's right -- about half the wage tax revenue for one year can be paid by the uncollected tax -- and once that property is back in the marketplace paying taxes on values in today's prices, those properties start to pay for the OTHER HALF.

Properties held in limbo by the city and the RDA, and everyone, everywhere, that is the pet of the party, a la Kenny Gamble, Universal, Cira, PHA, and all the underassessed, underpaying or nonpaying owners of this property have to start to pay. The BRT has to do FMV NOW. Council has to stop protecting its pet contributors. We all know who they are. The carrots held in blighted limbo for the right generous player to come along have to go instead to the highest bidder in an open, competitive process of sale.

If the paper can't get that there is a huge price of corruption in this city, and that YOU pay every time you get a paycheck, then the press is failing utterly.

Property taxes if paid and assessed in real dollars in todays values will pay for the cost of the revenue lost in abolition of the wage tax.

There's no other way. There's no way to get a biotech start up to not go to KofP and stay here (because the technology starts here in Philly) unless the WAGE TAX IS GONE.

Not reduced.

GONE.

Say it with me. GONE BABY GONE.

Your own paper is looking at moving out, and why is that? Come on. Most of you journalists don't even live in the city, and its for a reason. Schools. Wage taxes.

Address this and save this town. The thing that is going to keep you here is the thing that is going to allow others to stay or come back.

Property taxes are going to have to be used to get rid of the wage tax. Think you might want to cover how that might work, especially as they are voting today on one more ineffectual budget that business can't wait to see if someone finally gets that costs are too high to stay, including PMH?

You make some very good points, but need to work on your delivery. Instead of 10, 5 paragraph comments, you could've said it all in one 2 paragraph comment. More people will listen (read) that way.

Collect overdue property taxes, reduce the wage tax by half.

Have the new properties now paying because they have new owners paying their fair share in real values today and reduce wage taxes by a quarter.

Now, have FMV on property in real average market values.

Real costs need real assessments in real dollars.

The press lives in a fantasy, as does Council. That fantasy says that there are enough wage earners to cover not collecting and assessing property taxes.

Property owners have to pay property taxes on what the property is actually worth. That means in full, on time. Not when Cira feels like it, not when the Trigen station feels like it, not when Toll Brothers feels like it, not when Uni-Penn feels like it. Not when PHA feels like it, not when the RDA feels like it, not when PIDC feels like it. Not when the city feels like finally getting rid of a few dozen properties. Use it, or lose it.

Philly can't afford the cost to jobs just to be a low property tax destination.

If you want jobs, real jobs, that pay a real salary, then you have to let business come back in. The wage tax created a discount on property tax assessments that the BRT made unofficially official. Too bad THAT'S ILLEGAL. Nonuniformity violates PA state law.

So of course the BRT is fighting FMV. It goes against their policy of undervaluing property ESPECIALLY for the "lose that file" crowd.

The only way to get rid of the wage tax is to use property taxes. Property taxes for seniors and the disabled are frozen. So what is the hold up? Any Council member will tell you they are trying to protect seniors, and if you're too stupid to know that seniors can freeze property taxes because you don't live here and you don't know that we get a form in every property tax bill to do exactly that, well, shame on you for being an out of it press, says Council.

Who really benefits from this system of having job killing wage taxes, illegally undervaluing property and not collecting property taxes? Why is that question of so little interest to the press?

Why are you guys so clueless about this issue? Why do you always report what Council tells you as fact? Sometimes they lie to you, and you don't catch it.

Fact: Seniors and the disabled get their property taxes frozen. Period.

Fact: Uneven assessments violate state law.

Fact: Property taxes if allowed to float to real values could pay for the cost of ending the wage tax.

Who then is Council trying to protect by keeping wage taxes? Follow the money.

But NO, let's uh tax valets. That's the ticket.

If you want to read those stories posted, you have to buy them, they're that old.

In my mind, that's not even close to what you need to be doing, which is to make little spreadsheet. Just a little one.

Wage taxes: $1.2 billion

Now, other side of your list...

Overdue property taxes: $500 million

Assessed FMV property taxes: $500 million more

Cuts to wasteful spending such as all union labor and instead contracting out for municipal services: $2 million (at least). Even just using private ambulance service for overflow is going to save that much.

EQUALS a balanced budget without the wage tax.

Most likely it equals a surplus. But that means that the city has to deal with these problems, and obviously that means the press has to deal with them fully and often, not just in the archives you have to pay to find.

What is the city and the RDA even planning to do with all this property that could be paying property taxes?

Does the press even wonder? Do you even go, gee, why does the city and the RDA hold and own all this property? Never causes you to ask? And you think you are actually doing a fair job covering unpaid taxes?

Really? Seriously? For real?

You have to forgive me if I give the impression that I think the press here is pack of idiots. But I can't disguise my flabbergastedness that you guys have NO interest in the obvious.

If you hate the wage tax, propose a solution.

Here's one -- collect property taxes, assess real market property taxes, and stop letting the city or "Authorities" or nonprofits own property that doesn't pay taxes for years and years. Do you even want to ask why the city and the RDA have done this? That's something you won't even find in the archives.

Someone who explains why this is.

Honestly, Harrisburg should put a moratorium on payments to Philly for any reason until Philly and collects overdue property taxes, puts FMV in place, collects water bills, gas bills, fines, in an objective, prompt, untamperable fashion.

Then other property tax payors on the state can pony up for Philly's schools, police, and the cost of Philly not collecting its own bills owed the city.

There has to be some means, since the press is committed to doing as little as possible and still calling itself a source of journalism, to getting Philly to collect its bills. "We covered this and you can look it up" is not a three part series such as the one recently done for homelessness. Let's cover this, if you are going to say you cover it.

Why does the city own thousands of properties that pay no taxes? Why does the RDA hold so much that it does nothing with, and why does the new owner who gets it not have to pay old tax liens, which is really old school debt never paid?

If you wanted to invent a way to create bad schools that are a crime, and a schools system this bad is a crime upon children, then this would be how to do it.

Have a press that says, "Oh, the wage tax is being voted on today, for some incremental change, whatever. Overdue property taxes, oh well. FMV, oh my, whenever I write about taxes on anything, oh, I just type myself to sleep. Oh dear. Dippity doopity doo."

Money is the solution to everything you write about. Revenue. You can't address homelessness, you can't address crime, you can't address schools, you can't get anything done unless you have it.

You should have a treatment of tax revenue and the current budget in every cri de coeur piece you do. That's how to pay for change. That's coverage.

You boast that the city hired 25 new staffers in the law dept. but did you realize that the city hasn't had a Tax Delinquency collection since Nutter's been elected? What are these 25 new staffers tasked with doing, if not sending property to sheriff sale?

www.phillysheriff.com/homeadvertisedate.html

There are the mortgage sale dates, and the tax lien sale dates for the private collector. But where are the Tax Delinquency sale dates?

If you guys even watched how the city actually collected revenue, you could really be effective in your calls for change. As it is, I'm pretty sure that rewriting the press release is still just stenography.