11.09 2019
The Nairobi city county task force on Land Valuation Roll is on a working retreat in Mombasa considering mechanisms for transitioning from the 1980 Valuation Roll. The taskforce is expected to come up with a new proposal of a rates struct for levying rates on property. Currently, the County Levies property rates at the rate of 25% of the 1980 Unimproved Site Values. For the last two days, the task force has been grappling with analysis of multiple variable covering 156,000 properties captured in the proposed 2019 valuation roll. The taskforce consists of technical teams from Lands, Economic Planning, Legal, Revenue and public communications.
The taskforce is chaired by the Chief Officer Economic Planning Dr. Washington Makodingo.
Dr. Makodingo has exuded confidence that the transition process will go on smoothly given the safeguards adopted by the committee. He emphasized the important consideration of the plight of the low income earners in coming up with the rate. He reiterated H. Excellency Governor Mike Sonko’s pro- poor policy whose philosophy continues to transform many lives.
In his view , the County Director of Economic Planning Mr. Kefa Omanga said:- ” The enactment of a new valuation roll is a major milestone in the administration of property that has far reaching implications on both the business environment, the County’s capacity to render services and the County’s overall competitive index as a destination for investment. As you may know, nobody is producing more land. At the same time, land remains a key factor of production with defined inelasticity. It is for this reason that the task force has had to delve into deep macro- fiscal realities surrounding property appreciation in order to arrive at a rate that will spur Economic growth in the City. We look forward to an intensive stakeholder engagement to ensure everyone has the right information on this process as time for enactment is limited”.
Those present include the County Chief Officer for Lands Mr S.G. Mwangi, County director for Legal Affairs Mr. Oseko, Chief Valuer Mr. Nyoike, Head of Revenue Mr. Asman Shaban, ICT team and other technical officers.