This year, unlike the last one, most of the large municipalities did not dare to raise local taxes in Bulgaria. They will compensate this with measures to improve collection. Specially, the garbage fee becomes the most stable tax. Last year it had a substantial growth because of the deductions that municipalities have to pay to the state for a tonne disposed waste. The amount of the deduction increases this year – from 15 to 22 levs, but changes in the garbage fee are almost non-existent. Stara Zagora and Lovech are the only larger municipalities, considering an increase in their garbage fees due to deductions to the state for garbage collection.
In Lovech the increase was by 7 levs per tonne compared to 2013, or by 40 percent. That is why before the Christmas holidays, the municipal council there raised by 0.1 percentage points the fee to reach 1.4 per mil for residential properties in the town, while for the surrounding villages it increased from 3.7 to 4.6 per mil. For businesses properties there was no change.
Municipal Council of Stara Zagora passed a raising of the amount of garbage fee for citizens to from 1.2 per mil to 1.5 per mil, while the changes for businesses – were hiked from 3.2 per mil to 3.5 per mil.
Burgas is on the other end. The proposal of the mayor of one of the richest municipalities in Bulgaria, Dimitar Nikolov, was the Municipal Council to reduce the fee for legal entities dwon from 10.5 per mil to 7.9 per mil, including offices from 10 per mil to 7 per mil. The reasons for the decrease are the construction of the regional landfill in the village of Bratovo as well as an integrated system for waste collection, which will reduce the amount that the municipality will pay to the state.
Vratsa does not provide an increase in the amount of local taxes and fees.
In Dobrich there will be no change, unlike the situation from the previous three years, when the City Hall increased various taxes.
Local taxes and fees in Sliven, Ruse, Blagoevgrad, Veliko Turnovo and Sofia will not change in 2014.
Varna citizens will enjoy a small reduction in the garbage fee. Councilors decided to reduce the fee by 0.02 points for individuals and peg it at 0.98 per mil, while tax rates for cars will fall by 5 percentage points. The entire issue with the local taxes fell captive to the political scandal with the change of the old Turkish names of some places in Varna, and was repealed by the Varna District Governor Ivan Velikov.
In Plovdiv garbage fee remains intact, there is a decrease but for the local property taxes.
The BANKER
