City administration fails to meet revenue target

City administration fails to meet revenue target

JAKARTA (JP): The City Revenue Office could not meet the
revenue target from parking taxes for the last 1993-94 period,
reportedly due to extortion in public parking lots and the fact
that many private buildings have been "reluctant" to pay parking
taxes.

Fauzie Alvie Yasin, the head of the office, told reporters
yesterday about the collection problems at the end of a plenary
meeting at the City Council.

Fauzie said that the targeted city revenue from parking taxes
for the 1993-94 period was Rp 9 billion. Although the city
revenue office succeeded in collecting Rp 8 billion for that
period, the amount of parking taxes targeted for 1994-95 has
risen to Rp 14 billion, he said.

Currently, there are many groups of extortionists, who are
usually hoodlums who "rule" the street. They have territories
where they illegally operate as parking attendants, Fauzie said.

"To deal with these people, we must employ an indirect
approach by first improving the quality of our parking officers.
If our officers cannot handle them, we might consider asking the
city stability and public order agency (Bakorstanasda) to help
us," said Fauzie.

As for the delayed payments from privately managed parking
lots, Fauzie said the problem was that the owners of private
buildings -- such as Gajah Mada Plaza or Glodok Plaza for
instance -- objected to the taxes imposed on them based on a
gubernatorial decree issued in 1992.

According to the fifth article of the decree, 25 percent of
gross parking fees they collected had to be submitted to the city
administration as taxes.

They objected because they had invested a lot of money to
build the parking lots and, even without the 25 percent tax, it
was going to take them a very long time to make up their
investment, Fauzie said.

"Because of that, they reluctantly paid the parking taxes and
as a result, the city revenue from the taxes were behind target,"
Fauzie said.

That's why there is no private parking service -- a business
which would derive 100 percent of it's income from managing
parking lots -- because such business would for sure incur
losses, he added.

This problem, however, was actually offset by the sixth
article of the decree. Article six stipulates if the owners of
the buildings had built parking facilities, the capacity of which
were 50 percent larger than was required by official regulations,
they would be exempted from paying the tax or any other expenses
in acquiring building permits.

The third article of the decree also helped the owners earn
more from parking fees by allowing them to charge parking fees up
to Rp 2,500. This fee is far more expensive than the average
price for parking which ranges from Rp 300 to Rp 500 for the
first two hours.

However, Fauzie said that there was still no accord between
his office and the city parking agency, the City Transportation
and Traffic Control Agency (DLLAJ), and the mayoralties in which
the parking lots were situated because each agency has its own
interpretation of the articles.

"Hence, we plan to develop a pilot project to coordinate all
related agencies," Fauzie said. (arf)