MIN CHARTER 2019-04-25 (2018-2020)

Home

Hawai`i County Charter Commission -10 April 25, 2019 MS. MIURA: Sorry, Lisa Miura with Real Property Tax, it was a couple of months ago I reviewed it for the last meeting that I think they ended up not having it, I recall the numbers were correct, but it was very, it was very skewed because it didn't provide a very overall explanation of the min tax program. I do have answers to some of the other questions that you just asked earlier and I don't know when it is appropriate to address the group. Okay. There's approximately 46,000 parcels that are in the minimum tax bracket and your other question was approximately how much funds is generated. It is between 4-5 million dollars, so the Council would need to find that revenue elsewhere. I think one of the questions or the comments was about agricultural properties. There is a difference when a property is sitting vacant doing nothing and the County Council, Administration, and the constituents of the island did press for many years to have agricultural be active, and so they do provide a break when property is used as agriculture. I know there was a concern I believe, that the Ag (agriculture) was not paying enough and people were paying too little, by getting rid of the minimum tax, 4,000 of those parcels would actually pay less than minimum tax and I am not sure you were aware of that in the analysis because you probably didn't have access to that data. The other thing with the Ag group and me and you have never met before, I have been with the Property Tax since 2011, so I realize you have a lot of concerns, but there is a Real Property Review Group and an Ag Committee that is made up of ranchers, people from the Cattlemen's Association, part of the agricultural community, and they do have a large proposal that will come before County Council this year that is to address the discrepancies especially with property in Puna, trying to do farms where our Ag program is actually at a higher value than what their market value would be. So I disagree with your statement that we are doing nothing. MR. HOPKINS: Oh well, yeah. On the one there, I have a question though. But is it fair and this is a personal question, you don't have to answer it. You can decline. Is it fair for somebody who has 292 acres of land be paying the same tax rate, or the same amount of tax as someone who has 8,000 square feet? MS. MIURA: Well, if that 8,000 square feet... MR. HOPKINS: If they are both doing agriculture. Let's just say they are both doing agriculture. MS. MIURA: Okay. MR. HOPKINS: Now they are different types of agriculture. MS. MIURA: Correct. Page 34