JP/8/Parkir

Bambang Nurbianto The Jakarta Post Jakarta

The City Council is likely to approve a bylaw next month on a parking tax that would require all private parking management firms to pay 20 percent of their total revenue to the city administration.

Head of the City Revenue Agency Deden Supriadi said that deliberation of the bylaw's draft was expected to be finalized this month and would be enforced early next year.

Deden said the bylaw would become legal grounds for the city administration to administer the new tax on private parking firms, which have refused to comply with a gubernatorial decree requiring them to pay 25 percent of their revenue.

He said that the parking tax would contribute significantly to the own-source revenue of the city administration.

The city categorizes parking as either parking on the street or on private land, which requires all vehicle owners to pay parking fees.

"The parking tax is expected to contribute between Rp 14 billion and Rp 15 billion to the own-source revenue," Deden said after attending a meeting on the bylaw with councillors in the City Council building on Tuesday.

Chairman of City Council Commission C for city revenue Anna RL Sentot shared Deden's viewpoint, adding that the city administration could not act firmly against the management companies, which had neglected to pay part of their revenue to the city.

"Without the bylaw, the city administration will not be able to press parking managements to pay the tax," said Anna, adding that the bylaw would be in line with Law No. 34/2000 on regional taxes and levies.

She said that before the law was enacted, the city governor had issued a decree that regulated private parking management firms to pay 25 percent of their parking revenue to the city administration.

Anna said a gubernatorial decree could not be used as legal grounds to tax parking management firms.

This year, the city administration has set a target of Rp 3.4 billion to be collected from taxes for parking on privately owned land. Data from the city council showed that only Rp 1.3 billion was collected until July.

The city administration has missed its tax revenue target due to bad management, not only through parking managed by private sectors, but also street parking, which is managed by the City Parking Body (BP Parkir).

Data from the city administration showed that up until July BP Parkir had collected Rp 7.2 billion from its target of Rp 28.6 billion, which should be collected this year.

Toto Ismunandar, a member of the City Council Commission D for development affairs, said parking in the city had not been managed well, therefore there was still rampant misappropriation of funds from this sector.

Anna also said the expected bylaw would not set the rates for car owners to pay for private parking as that would come under the gubernatorial decree later.

The economic assistant to the city secretary, Ma'mun Amin, said that the city administration would soon propose a draft on the parking bylaw that would become the comprehensive ruling on parking affairs in the city.

He said that the bylaw on private parking would not cover the parking operators' obligations to their customers, including vehicle security. The bylaw would also not rule that parking operators had to guarantee a parking space for vehicles.

"These rules will be covered in a separate bylaw on parking affairs, which will be immediately proposed by the city administration," said Ma'mun.

So far nearly all parking operators in the city do not give a security guarantee to their customers. Even in several areas managed by private parking firms, customers are asked to pay a parking fee although they cannot find a parking space.