Saying that Houston Estates owes almost $450 million in taxes to the city, Georgetown Mayor Ubraj Narine yesterday said the company has been using one compliant account to process the sale of lands which fall under other accounts that are in arrears.
Narine told a press conference yesterday that the city administration has records for four Houston Estates accounts, three of which have outstanding balances. He noted that the single account 044-00001, which is up to date with its payments, is being used for the compliance to process the transactions for all other lands.
The amounts $115,154,906, $174,806,614 and $157,500,817 ($447,462,337 in total) are outstanding from the accounts 041-000001, 042-000001 and 043-000001, respectively, according to Narine, who explained that every division and sub-division of the lands has a different account in the council’s records.
“We are not against this company. All we are asking is that they gave us our fair share. We have been asking them to come and talk to us and submit the documents, the plan for the sub divided lands and the transport for us to verify but they have not done so,” Narine said.
According to the Mayor, on November 18th the city council’s Special Finance Committee met with Duane Lopes, Company Secretary of Houston Estates, to iron out the issue of outstanding taxes on the three accounts. During the meeting, Narine said, they asked Lopes to submit the necessary transports and plans for the lands at Plantation Houston and Rome (which falls under the accounts) along with all subdivided lands to clarify why account 044-00001 was used to apply for all compliances instead of the individual accounts.
However, the Mayor said that the company has since failed to submit the documents and although a letter was sent to remind Lopes of the meeting, he has failed to respond.
Narine stated that during the meeting, Lopes had informed the Special Finance Committee that the transports and plans for the lands are “very old” but Lopes was informed that the committee would still like to look at them.
In a letter, dated November 20th, Narine said it was necessary to seek a resolution and added that if the company fails to comply with the council’s request, the council would be forced to take alternative action to recover overdue taxes.
“If we receive the documents and we are wrong, we will accept that and apologise but they are not coming forward to meet with us and it is unfair… We at the Mayor and City Council [are] trying to put up a resolution but we are not able to do so. If they had come to us as we requested this matter would not have reached to the media,” Narine stressed.
The Mayor further stated that during a 2017 Finance Committee meeting, a decision was taken for the correct tax to be levied on the owners of lands at Plantation Houston/Rome.
The council had agreed that lands sold by the estate for residential and commercial purposes should attract taxes of 40% and 250%, respectively.
It was noted that Houston Estates has been selling land that was titled as agricultural lands and attracted a 40% tax since 2005. With that development, the council decided to revalue the lands and have the correct value attached, since the use had changed.
Deputy Mayor Alfred Mentore during the press conference said that the council has been advised to pursue the matter to recoup the outstanding balance through the courts.
Attorney for Houston Estates, Timothy Jonas told Stabroek News yesterday he did not have any comments to make.
He had previously said Houston Estates had paid its due. “They [City Hall] have acknowledged and we have always paid. For them to turn around and multiply by 10 is something,” he said last week, before noting that he did not want to say much about the issue as it is currently engaging a court. He did, however, stress that his clients did not owe City Hall.
Redstart Investments
Meanwhile, Mentore yesterday announced that the city has withdrawn the injunction obtained to freeze the sales agreement between Redstart Investments and Houston Estates.
He noted that they have recognised that the compliance, which was secured using the 044-000001 account, was already approved and therefore they dropped the injunction.
Redstart Investments, according to the council, had written and said its deal with Houston Estates should not be affected by a debt that isn’t the company’s and recently notified City Hall that it would in turn move to the courts to have the injunction discharged.
However, Narine said there is an outstanding amount of $115,154,906 in taxes owed for the 52 acres of land Redstart is purchasing in the South Rome section of Plantation Houston. He also noted that the taxes will have to be cleared off before the council can approve any building plans. “That amount will be inherited by purchase. If they want to erect a building they would have to clear off the taxes before they are given permission to build,” Narine pointed out while stating that he is not at the council to “suppress development but rather have companies honour their obligations by paying their taxes.”
The Mayor said he has reached out to Redstart Investments requesting a meeting but to date his correspondence is still to be answered.
A notice in the Official Gazette had informed of the sale of land for residential, commercial and industrial purposes to Redstart Investments Guyana Inc.
