DAVAO CITY– Davao City has posted a 21-percent increase in its local tax collection in the first two months of the year, according to the City Council Committee on Finance, Ways and Means.
From January to February this year, the city collected a total of PHP2.594 billion, higher than the PHP2.135 billion collection for the same period in 2017.
Councilor Danilo Dayanghirang, chair of the Committee on Finance, said the increase in the tax collection is the result of the tax adjustment that the city implemented after 12 years of not amending the local tax code.
“The 21 percent increase is the result of our tax code amendments. This will show how big the impact is on the budget of the city. I predict that our 2019 budget will (be) boosted following this significant increase in our tax collections,” Dayanghirang said.
For this year, the City has a total budget of PHP7.6 billion, of which, the biggest chunk was allocated for social projects, particularly the Lingap Para sa Mahirap program.
Dayanghirang said the tax collection will further increase in the next months of the year 2018 until 2019 as the increase in the real property tax is scheduled for implementation in 2019 yet.
“We have not yet implemented an increase in our local tax collection, it is scheduled in 2019. The increase of our tax collection will boost our annual budget, this means that the city can further extend assistance to the people,” he said.
Dayanghirang also admitted he received some complaints following the amendments to the local tax code.
“We already forwarded the complaints to the City Mayor’s Office. They will be the one to act on the complaints,” he said. (Funny Pearl A. Gajunera/PNA)
