30mil in assessment arrears owed to MBPJ
ABOUT 18,500 property owners in Petaling Jaya owe the Petaling Jaya City Council more than RM30mil in assessment arrears and the local authority has issued 3,000 warrants of attachments that could see properties being sealed and owners hauled to the municipal court.
The campaign that started yesterday targets the worst offenders, who owe assessment amounting to RM20mil and most of it are those owning vacant land, failure to settle assessment for at least five years and those who have evaded dues for commercial lots.
At the full board meeting, Petaling Jaya City Council (MBPJ) mayor Datuk Mohamad Roslan Sakiman said the 3,000 owners of properties had racked up assessments arrears despite numerous reminders and it was time to crack the whip.
“Our debt recovery section has teamed up with the enforcement department to visit the owners of the properties to encourage them to settle their dues before the one-week grace period expires.
“Every person on the list has had bills, reminders and orders issued to them and this is the last stage.
“These defaulters have plenty of opportunties to contact us and arrange a payment plan but we have had no contact from these people. This is the last resort,” he added.
Eoslan said the council’s census showed that those who defaulted were mostly land owners who risk having the vacant commercial and residential plots seized.
“For about 100 house owners, they have defaulted the annual RM380 and this amount has ballooned close to RM2,000.
“For these people, they should just come and settle the amount or make a commitment with our office to settle in part payments,” he said.
Roslan added that those who rented houses or commercial lots where the owners had not settled their assessments also risked having the moveable items sealed.
“We have no choice but to act in an aggressive manner to recover the assessment dues to drive the message that MBPJ is serious in recovering the arrears,” he said.
On another issue, Roslan said most of the common complaints received were faulty traffic lights and this occurred just after rain.
“We have 98 traffic lights and last month alone we received 57 complaints regarding traffic lights.
“Our initial investigations show that the cables malfunctioned due to water seepage into the electrical connections,” he said.
Roslan said the most common areas of traffic lights complaints came from Jalan Mahogany in Kota Damansara and Persiaraan Surian stretch.
The other issue discussed was the upgrading of the Rothmans roundabout that would be replaced with a traffic light junction that would cost about RM5mil.
“About 40 companies have tendered for the project and the proposals will be submitted by Dec 20 for discussion.
“At this moment the traffic light junction would be the immediate solution but a better idea is to have a flyover,” he said.
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