A to-do list for the mayor
Mayor Stephanie C. Rawlings-Blake's transition committee of 150 (yes, 150) volunteers has several pointed things to say on real-estate-related matters.
In its newly released report, it criticized Baltimore's Department of Housing and Community Development, urged action on the 30,000 vacant properties in the city and suggested that the time might have come to revoke nonprofits' property-tax exemption.
"The reality is that City government cannot continue to function as it has in the past," the committee wrote in its report.
The nonprofit tax suggestion is for "all or some" nonprofits to "be assessed at a reduced rate, to offset the cost of services provided them." The city has looked to nonprofits before in tight times. (Here's a 1996 story about "payments in lieu of taxes," in case you'd like to take a trip through memory lane.)
Other tax suggestions to consider, committee members said: a nonresident earnings tax -- often known as a "commuter tax."
The housing and community development department, which goes by Baltimore Housing nowadays, came in for sharp words. Committee members wrote that the agency "is often the last actor to commit public subsidies to a development project, resulting in significant delays."
"The department’s strategic plan must emphasize community development and neighborhoods, as the agency appears to lack a clear and coherent vision for revitalizing Baltimore's neighborhoods," the report says. "Almost symbolic of the agency's lack of vision is that it has dropped 'community development' from its name."
The committee also wants to see the 30,000 vacant properties in the city managed better -- and a close scrutiny of everything the city owns, vacant or not. Sell, in other words.
"Properties that are not needed for public use ... should be offered to the public in an open and transparent fashion," the report says.
Here's Julie Scharper's story about the report.
So: Thoughts?
Categories: Neighborhood improvement, Property taxes
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Comments
yes, yes, yes, and yes.
Posted by: Larry | March 23, 2010 8:40 AM
The large scale ownership of properies has never made much sense. Why should the city hold title to thousands of pieces of property, incur legal liabilities for them, responsibilities for upkeep, etc., when there's no manifest public purpose for it? Those properties shold be turned over to private hands as soon as possible to turn them back into productive pieces of real estate. As they are, they stay off the tax rolls and become liabilities for the city instead of tax-revenue generating assets.
Posted by: BaltimoreGeof | March 23, 2010 10:27 AM
How do we go about making this happen? Let's fix Baltimore. Where do we start?
Posted by: Active Jack | March 23, 2010 11:04 AM
Before raising taxes one thin dime, City Hall should take a look at the "cost" of operating "quasi-agencies" like the Parking Authority.
PA's 2009 Annual Report touts annual revenues of $30 million a year in parking fees (meters, municipal garages and residential parking permits. By comparison, DC collects over $80m a year in parking ticket fees.
Yet PA's 2009 Annual Report cites a single Grant ($3.1m) from the City as its primary source of revenue. Operating expenses are booked at $3.3m. So this quasi-agency is costing taxpayers at least $200K a year - for what?
The Parking Authority has not constructed a single municipal garage in over 5 years. Most of the computerized EZ Park Meters function improperly. The online residential parking permit application and payment program has been described by PA staff as a disaster.
The Parking Authority’s responsibilities should be shifted back to the City’s Department of Transportation where Parking Enforcement is currently administered.
Posted by: FaxMam | March 23, 2010 12:28 PM
I agree with the last post by active Jack. They own all this property and could sell/rent some of it's prime real estate off. That would help with the budget instead of taxing more. That is enough with the taxes. The poor (for the most part)city residents are struggling as it is. That is the ones who even pay taxes.
Posted by: mary real ann | March 23, 2010 3:27 PM