City residents who got this year's property tax assessments may have noticed a sharp increase in the amount - as much as 20%. It's no mistake - the City Council has increased taxes for the second time in four years. Except this time it was without consultation.
We asked the mayor about it and he directed us to the valuation manager, Troy Smith.
He says this adjustment was supposed to happen 13 years ago, but has been put off twice. He explained that in order for the council to effectively continue its work, the system has to be adjusted to reflect current market realities. He told us more today.
Troy Smith, Valuation Manager, Belize CitCo
"The situation is this: that quinquennial that was done was 2013 which was over 12 years ago. The law maintains that every municipality should do a quinquennial every five years. For Belize City the last one was done 2013, 2018 and then 2018 was the second one we did but then the council changed and the new council didn't implement that quinquennial for 2018 to 2022. What happened in 2022 which is the other quinquennial is that COVID came in 2020 and then everything escalated and the council didn't execute the 2022 quinquennial because of the COVID situation. Now we're in 2026 where another quinquennial is due and this time the council agreed because we looked at the budgeted expense to maintain the city. basically in my view, the city council budget for the year is over $30 million to run the city. We're at 27 million right now. and so it is deemed by law to look into the quinquennial to adjust the taxes so as not to increase a burden on the tax payers but a little more so the council can actually provide the essential services such as streets, drains, garbages, bridges, traffic managements, and beautifications of parks."
"It's 18% on occupied properties when it comes to buildings and commercial businesses and in 2022 the council didn't push that 28 variance because that would be a burden and what we did, we did a 1% adjustment in the rate, not in the assessment, so my argument is that every property that can check their assessment and look at the market to see if the rental value is high or low based on the open market and I can tell you for a fact as the valuator, we're not there as real rental market and real market value on the tax roll and that is even without gradual adjustment in the valuation roll."
"Because of the adjustment in the taxes, there is the incentive program that we give back to property owners. As we said on the commercial, January 1st for early payment is 15, February is 10, and March is 5. And then senior citizen is 35% on the total outstanding, but for one how that you reside. So the incentive also gives back an ease to property owners so as to balance their budget and balance the fiscal process."
Smith also explained that the law does not mandate consultations, and with the holiday season, the Council is just now doing its media rounds to educate the public about the increase.
