Bucks County to charge real estate tax dodgers for costs
Bucks County is letting tax-dodging property owners know that they soon will be charged for the costs of not paying.
The Bucks commissioners authorized the county’s Tax Claim Bureau to charge delinquent property taxpayers 106% percent of the taxes owed.
The extra 6% includes 5% toward the cost of running the bureau and 1% to the attorney handling the case. Previously, the 5% was taken from the amounts owed to the municipalities and school districts, so taxpayers were footing the bill for those in delinquency.
Under the new method, ”it’s going to return 100% of the taxes owed back to the municipalities and school districts,” said Michael Clark, solicitor for the Tax Claim Bureau.
Clarke, of the law firm of Rudolph Clarke of Trevose, explained the advantages to the new program at the commissioners’ meeting Aug. 12.
He said the new “hybrid method” uses provisions from both the Real Estate Tax Sale Law and recent revisions to the Pennsylvania Municipal Claims and Tax Liens Act to not only charge the delinquent taxpayer for the costs involved in collecting the debt but also to put liens not only on the property in question but on all properties owned by the person until the delinquent taxes are paid.
Montgomery County adopted a similar program about eight years ago and Clarke, who is also solicitor for that county’s Tax Claim Bureau, said it is paying big dividends for municipalities like Norristown that are seeing more revenue coming in and delinquent properties being sold quicker so they can be renovated if they are blighted and returned to contributing to the tax roles.
He said one official in Montgomery County told him “our business manager loves this program.”
Clarke said the program is not designed to take homes from the elderly or unemployed who are facing economic struggles, but to collect taxes owed by serial delinquent taxpayers who may own multiple properties but fail to pay their property taxes on some of them.
“There’s almost sort of a little game that is played,” he said, where someone will have several delinquent properties but only pay their back taxes on a property about to be sold at a sheriff’s sale by the county because of delinquent taxes owed.
Commissioner Gene DiGirolamo wanted assurances that the program is not targeting residents who are in financial distress.
Clarke said anyone currently receiving counseling or assistance from the county would not be included and, going forward, any homeowners seeking governmental assistance with a tax debt would not be targeted by the hybrid plan.
He stressed the purpose is not to put anyone out of their home who is having trouble financially, but to have serial delinquents pay what is owed so that municipalities and schools districts are not left with revenue shortfalls.
“We’re now getting properties back on the tax roles,” he said.