The provision partially solves the problem for owners who did not know that in order to be exempt from paying municipal fees for vacant and non-electrified properties, they had to submit a responsible statement to the relevant Municipality, in addition to the DEDDIE certificate, as it had asked POMIDA during the recent meeting with the Minister of the Interior Mr. Panos Skourletis. It even provides for a six-month deadline for the owners to submit the responsible declarations.
While the problem is solved for the past, for those who are of course informed about the above six-month deadline, the bill makes the same problem unsolved for the future, leaving completely uncovered the simple and uninformed citizen, as it provides that as long as he does not submit the responsible declaration to the Municipality, he will pay twice the amount of municipal fees for each empty and unused property!!!
The regulation contradicts no only with common sense but also with the recent opinion of the Ombudsman on the matter, which asked for the exemption of vacant and non-electric properties from municipal fees to apply, regardless of the time they were declared vacant to the Municipal Authority.
POMIDA has submitted a specific legislative proposal on the issue of municipal fees, which secures the interests of the Municipalities but also protects citizens from arbitrariness. POMIDA’s proposal specifically provides for the following:
“Properties that are not used, and are not electrified, are exempted from paying municipal cleaning and lighting fees for as long as they remain vacant if the relevant OTA is filed a certificate from the DEDDIE or the provider regarding the interruption of the electricity supply and a relevant statement from the owner or his legal representative. If the above documents are submitted afterwards, the owner’s tax returns must also be submitted, from which it appears that the properties were declared as gaps for the time of exemption. In case the property is found to be in use, the entire fee corresponding to each category of property is imposed, together with the relevant fine, retroactively from the time of exemption. Amounts charged by the concerned Municipalities for this reason and have not yet been paid are deleted.”
The order of the Ministry of the Interior that has been put into consultation provides the following:
Article 207 – Amendment of article 3 par. 1 of Law 25/1975 (A’ 74) (on the exemption of vacant properties)
“1. The last two paragraphs of par. 1 of no. 3 of Law 25/1975 (A’ 74), as replaced by no. 5 of Law 3345/2005 (A’138), are replaced as follows:
“Properties, in which the electricity supply is interrupted, are exempted from the payment of cleaning and lighting fees from the date of submission of a statement by their owner or of its legal representative to the relevant municipality that they are not electrified and that they are not going to be used.
Until the submission of the above declaration, the fees are due per property category and are paid according to the provisions of article 21 of 24.9/ 20.10.1958 b.d. “on the codification in a single text of the law of the applicable provisions on the rents of municipalities and communities”. exemption period and an equivalent fine.”
- Debts from cleaning and lighting fees, which correspond to a period of time up to the publication of this, during which the electricity supply to a property had been interrupted, according to a certificate from the competent network manager and this was not used, according to a responsible declaration of the owner or his legal representative, their certificate is deleted or omitted. Since the above declaration has not been submitted by the time of publication hereof, it shall be submitted no later than six (6) months from it. Amounts that have been paid are not sought.”
However, the possibility of up to doubling of municipal fees is also provided for in article 182 of the same bill, which allows municipalities to impose large increases in municipal fees, especially for commercial properties, as it is provided that the maximum general or special rate to which they always fall can be set up to ten times the general rate of the residence, while with the current legislation (par. 4 of the article 7 of Law 2307/1995, A 113) it is expressly forbidden to exceed five times! >
Also in the same draft law there is another provision which introduces the establishment of three levels of the uniform remunerative fee for cleaning, lighting and greenery:
Article 182 – Meaning, content and method of determining remunerative fees.
“1. Par. 1 of article 1 of Law 25/1975 (A’ 74) is amended as follows:
“The single compensatory fee for cleaning, lighting and greenery is imposed on every property located within the administrative region of the municipalities and intended exclusively for the coverage of all types of expenses related to the provision of waste collection and management services, the electric lighting of streets, squares and all public areas, green maintenance services, as well as any other permanently provided service by the municipalities related or related to them. It is prohibited to use or commit the resources derived from the collection of the uniform remunerative fee for cleaning, lighting and greenery to cover any other costs and obligations.
The uniform remunerative fee for cleaning, lighting and greenery is calculated on the surface of of each property and results from the multiplication of its square meters by the coefficient of the uniform reimbursable fee, which is defined, per category of use of the properties, by a decision of the municipal council, which provides an accurate, up-to-date and fully documented justification for the determination of the coefficients of the fee at the appropriate amount.
The discussion and voting for the decision of the municipal council to determine the coefficients of the uniform reimbursable fee is conducted on the proposal of the Finance Committee and on submitted alternative proposals. Votes in favor of a specific proposal, whether submitted by the Finance Committee or in favor of alternative proposals, are considered valid. Blank votes are not taken into account for the majority calculation. The alternative proposals are submitted either to the Economic Committee during the drafting stage of its proposal or to the Municipal Council, during the discussion and voting of the coefficients of the uniform reimbursable fee. The possible alternative proposals are discussed separately, by general or special rate of the uniform reimbursable fee, and are put to a vote against each other. Each alternative proposal obligatorily takes into account all the code numbers of revenues and/or expenses related to the services, for which the single reimbursable fee is imposed, and which should be modified accordingly, so that in any case the balancing of the expenditures with revenues.
The proposal that gathers the absolute majority of the present members of the Municipal Council constitutes the approved, respectively, general or special rate. In the event that no proposal gathers the majority of the present members of the Municipal Council, then the vote is repeated between the first two proposals in votes
- Paragraph 4 of article 1 of Law 25/1975 is amended as follows:
“The coefficients of the uniform retributive fee, determined by the decision of paragraph 1 are divided into general and special coefficients.
The general coefficients are independent of each other, according to a minimum of three (3) and are differentiated according to the use of each property as follows:
1st coefficient: properties used exclusively for residence.
2nd coefficient: properties used for public, non-profit and charitable purposes.
3rd factor: real estate used for the exercise of any kind of economic activity.
Beyond above general rates, the municipal council may set special rates, as gradations of the general rates, for specific categories of real estate, provided that this is specifically justified due to the surface, their use or the geographical zone in which they are located or other specific objective characteristics them.
In any case, when determining the general and special factors, the properties of the properties are taken into account (area, covered or not, time of use, etc.), the degree to which the properties burden the services provided by the municipality concerned remunerative services, as well as its wider operation.
The general rate of the single retributive fee that concerns residences is mandatorily set at a lower level than the other two general rates, as well as their special rates.
at any given time, the maximum general or special factor cannot be set beyond ten times the general factor of the residence.”
THE COMPLETE PROPOSAL OF POMIDA
A complete proposal was submitted to the Minister of the Interior, Mr. Pan. Skurleti POMIDA, for solving the issue of exemption from municipal fees, vacant and non-electrical properties, which covers both the uninformed ordinary citizen and the finances of the Municipalities. The text of POMIDA’s proposal is as follows:
“Recommendation report
With the provision of article 5 par. 1 of Law 3345/2005, the owners of vacant and non-electrical properties are exempted from the municipal cleaning-lighting fees, if they submit to the relevant Municipality an application for exemption from the charging of municipal fees, to which they must attach a certificate from PPC (already DEDDIE) regarding the interruption of the electricity supply to the property, and their responsible statement to the Municipality that the property does not is electrified and is not used in any way.
Article 43 of Law 3979/2011 defined that “The managers of the electricity distribution network and the electricity suppliers are obliged to immediately transmit the above billing information and in general, the data of the debtors that are kept for the contribution of the amounts of case b’ to the relevant municipalities.” Therefore, the OTAs know, or should know, that the electricity supply has been interrupted, and therefore the use of every property that has a supply. electricity, and therefore the citizen’s obligation to make the relevant declaration is absent.
By circular 2856/20.1.2015 of the Ministry of the Interior, it was interpreted that the exemption does not start from the time of interruption of the electricity supply, but from the time of submission of the above supporting documents to the Revenue Service of the respective Municipality, without this arising from the text of the law. The problem that arises in practice is that most owners of empty buildings are unaware of the existence of this condition, content with the interruption of the electricity by DEDDIE, which notifies the relevant Municipality with a delay of many years or does not notify at all, even though it is obliged by law as above we mention, and in their declaration as “BLANK” in their annual income tax returns (form E2 for property income).
All this has resulted, over the years, in the Revenue Services of several Municipalities of the country to claim from the owners of vacant and non-electrical properties significant sums for municipal cleaning and lighting fees, which citizens are unable to pay, especially in view of the new provision for up to 20 years of limitation of obligations to OTA.
The Citizen’s Advocate also intervened on this matter, who with his letter number 23504/51444/2017 to the Ministry of the Interior pointed out that the interruption of electricity supply is a presumption for the non-use of the property and that since the current law does not set a deadline for the submission of the responsible statement, an additional condition is arbitrarily set for the exercise of the citizens’ right to exemption without being provided for by the law.
For the uniform application of this provision by all OTAs of the country, we propose its amendment as follows:
Proposed provision
“The provision of par. 1 of article 5 of Law 3345 /2005 (Government Gazette A΄138/2005) is amended after it came into force as follows:
“Properties that are not used, and are not electrified, are exempt from paying municipal cleaning and lighting fees for as long as they remain vacant since in the relevant O.T.A. a certificate from the DEDDIE or the provider regarding the interruption of the electricity supply and a relevant responsible statement of the owner or his legal representative must be submitted. If the above documents are submitted later, the owner’s rent tax declarations must also be submitted, from which it can be seen that the properties were declared vacant for the time of their exemption. In the event that use of the property is found, the entire fee corresponding to each category of property together with the relevant fine is imposed on the obligees, retroactively from the time of exemption. Amounts that have been charged by the relevant Municipalities for this reason and have not yet been paid are deleted.”
