CHC 1979-03-13 - Laserfiche WebLink

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MR. ZUZA`K.) Mr. Schutte, let me see by re- statement, if I properly understand the objective. If a buyer purchases and owns a piece of property., Intends to keep it over a long period of time until. it enhances in value far in excess of his purchase price and then sells. it. Is this the phase of speculation that you are referring to, that he keeps the property for twenty, twenty-five years and then proses to sell it? MR. SCHUTTE : No. What I am `speaking about is taking property that is, let ' s say, zoned for agriculture and he buysit at x number of dollars at a -price that exceeds what is economically feasible to get involved with agriculture today. He sits on it with the sole intent in a year or two that he will ,be able to get azoning change on that particular parcel. Maybe from an Ag:,-, 5 or an Ag-7, 10 or whatever it is and cut itup, to Ag,.® 1 and then sell it at a phenomenal cost. We've had situations. right there in Waimea, or in West Hawaii , where par-ce1s:have been,bought andsold and absolutely nothing done to them,and 'two and three times Within two yearsor three years and the amount of dollars that ,:have changed hands is phenomenal. It is ailrmost unbelievable. q-41- I 'm saying is that this ultimately affects what Mr. Mass was speaking about earlierof your property taxes. ' ou know, we have situations where, I ' ll give you a good exampl ', , our local people have had lands handed down to themover the years. And they might -have come through the great Mehele or from some awards from the king. And yet because of this speculation or the enhancement of property values , `t.heyfind that they can no longer own this parcel and if they could just stay there they find that they cannot afford to stay there. So as a result. . . MR. ZUZAK ;k' By reason of the increase' in the assessment. MR. SCHUTTE : That ' s right. MR. ZUZ1+.K;: a What we are proposing is exactly what you have directed your observation to. If we limit the increase of tax to the assessed value, as of let 's say, today. We can ' t go back for five, twenty years but at least from this point forward , somebody speculating on adjoining real estate or in the area cannotdrive you off that agricultural parcel of ground by reason of their cuttingup the land and selling it for an astronomical figure. And this is what is happening today because the tax structure, the method of assessment is based upon comparison. That comparison is affected when people from the mainland co 'e over here with a large number of dollars and buy a piece of 1r property and then turn around and resell it., or buy other properties near and continue to drive it up. hose, who live here are adversely affected and this is what we are trying to prevent. . .is the`i`r being adversely affected. They have not changed their use of the property. They have not imposed an -