City of Johannesburg’s proposed rates policy challenged
LOMBARDY EAST – Property value doesn't preclude people with low retirement or other income from being in need of a rates break.
A Johannesburg north-east resident has brought an official objection against the proposed rates policy published for comment by the City of Johannesburg for implementation on 1 July.
Riaan Naude, a resident of Lombardy East, said this objection is against the policy itself and not against individual property valuations for which separate objections the City is currently attending to.
In the current property rates policy‚ there are exemptions on properties owned and occupied by people who have limited income and are not pensioners but can show their annual income falls within a limit determined by the council, said Naude.
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In this category‚ Naude said the owner must apply every six months for the council’s approval. “I have an objection against the requirement for such a person to be forced into a six-monthly registration,” said Naude.
“As it is, this person is not being paid enough to properly survive on or to make future provision for their old age. I propose that the requirement is [upped] to 12 months for anyone who can prove that they meet the qualifying criteria whilst being employed fulltime.”
Since a property value of higher than R2 million would lose all rebates, apart from the existing first R200 000 rebate, Naude objected to this requirement saying the R2 million property value restriction has nothing to do with whether the individual is deserving of a discount or not.
According to him, the value of a property does not preclude people with other or low retirement income from being in need of a rates break.
It also does not imply that simply because a person of that age owns a property of a higher value that they have somehow not delivered a value to society, and that should be rewarded or acknowledged, said Naude.
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“Some properties may, in fact, exceed the R2 million valuation purely by where they are located rather than what lifestyle the property affords the owner.
“Regardless of the rates policy, the owner of the property will already be penalised on the value of the property in two additional ways,” he said.
Since the rates payable are already calculated on the value of the property, Naude said the exemption policy should not bring such a penalty to be a double whammy purely by virtue of exceeding an arbitrary value like a fixed R2 million.
Upon death, he said these values form part of one’s estate and will be taxed based on the value of the property.
Details: Riaan Naude rnaude@cats.co.za
