Mayor Yvonne Denise Aki-Sawyerr took office in Freetown, Sierra Leone, in May 2018, after serving as head of the Freetown City Council. A finance professional with over 25 years of experience in the public and private sectors, she had previously been involved with the campaign against blood diamonds and was instrumental in the response to the Ebola crisis in 2014. She has delivered two TED talks, about turning dissatisfaction into action and the capital city’s initiative to plant a million trees, and was named to the Time 100 Next list of emerging leaders and the BBC’s 100 Women list.
A leader in the C40 Cities global network, Aki-Sawyerr launched the Transform Freetown planning initiative and appointed Africa’s first chief heat officer, to confront the impacts of climate change. She holds degrees from the London School of Economics and Freetown’s Fourah Bay College, and is married with two children. She spoke with Senior Fellow Anthony Flint in the fall. Their conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Anthony Flint: Could you talk about the Transform Freetown initiative as a planning and action framework, and your assessment of its progress?
Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr: I ran for office in 2018, motivated by concerns around the environment and sanitation. My campaign message, “for community, for progress, for Freetown,” translated into Transform Freetown. It focuses on four categories: resilience, human development, healthy city, and urban mobility.
Resilience includes environmental management; it also includes urban planning, because you cannot separate the two, and revenue organization, because sustainability will only come from the city’s ability to sustain and generate revenue itself. The healthy city cluster includes sanitation, which goes very closely with environmental management for Freetown and many African cities. If you think about climate change, our teeny-weeny contribution to climate change, a lot of it actually comes from methane, from open dumping, but it also has huge health implications. So in the healthy city category was sanitation, health, and water.
What we did was, having come into office with those high-level areas of concern, we had 322 focus groups with about 15,000 residents to get their views on affordability, accessibility, and availability of services across those sectors. We invited the public sector, private sector, and the international community via development partners and NGOs to participate in roundtable discussions.
Out of that process came 19 specific, measurable targets that we’re working toward under Transform Freetown. We report against them every year back to the city, back to our residents. It really has been a way of introducing greater accountability, of holding our own feet to the fire, and it’s very much community owned and community driven.
AF: Among all the climate threats the city faces, you appointed a chief heat officer. Why was a chief heat officer necessary and what have been the results thus far?
YA: I’m asked often, how do you get ordinary people interested in climate change? In our case it’s not hard, because the consequences of climate change are intensely felt in our parts of the world. We suffer greatly from flooding and landslides, hence my concern with the environment and being able to mitigate those impacts.
The [Atlantic Council’s Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center] really got us thinking about the fact that there are more deaths from extreme heat than there are from the more visible and tangible disasters like the floods and landslides. Extreme heat, particularly where water is in short supply, is a major impact of the warming climate.
In our case, the vulnerable are mainly those living in informal settlements. That’s 35 percent of our city’s population, and in those informal settlements, the housing structures are typically made from corrugated iron. With increased temperatures, you’re effectively living in an oven. The other aspect of that is we have an informal economy. Around 60 percent of women in our city are involved in trading. Most of our markets are outdoors, so you’re sitting in the sun all day long. Doing that under the intense heat means that [other] negative health consequences are exacerbated.
With the chief heat officer, we now are going to be able to embark on some research, collecting data to identify the heat islands; anecdotally, we have a sense of where those are, mainly in the informal settlements, but potentially also in the middle of the city. We need to be able to make arguments to challenge what’s going on with the lack of building permits, and land use planning being devolved to the city, and the massive deforestation that continues unabated.
The chief heat officer has worked with market women and gotten funding from Arsht-Rock to install market shade covers in three of our open markets. It’s great to see the enthusiasm of the women and them saying, “Are we going to get this all the way along the market? We can see where it’s starting, where it stops, but we need it too.”
Newly installed shades in the markets of Freetown, Sierra Leone, help residents cope with extreme heat. Credit: Courtesy photo.
AF: What are your hopes for other climate mitigation projects, including the initiative to plant a million trees? How did that come about, and how is it going?
YA: Well, it came about because there’s an appreciation that we were losing our vegetation and that [worsens] the effect of extreme weather events, [as when heavy rains led to massive mudslides in 2017]. The lack of forestation is a major part of that. The goal is to increase vegetation cover by 50 percent.
Planting the million trees is the long-term plan, but in the meantime, you still have the runoff from the mountains filling the drains with silt. Our annual flood mitigation work identifies the worst of these areas and clears the silt so that when the rains come, the water can still flow. On a smaller scale, we’ve also been able to build something like 2,000 meters of drainage in smaller communities. Beyond that, we’ve invested heavily in disaster management training and capacity building.
The thing about climate change impacts is they are really pervasive. If people are experiencing crop failure outside of Freetown, it will eventually drive a rural-urban migration because they’re unable to sustain their livelihoods and they’re going to come to the city looking for some means of making a living.
That pressure of population growth in the city is something else that we have to deal with—whether it’s introducing the cable car to improve transportation and reduce greenhouse gas emissions [or encouraging] the government to devolve land use planning and building permit functions so that we can actually introduce land management actions, which save life and save property but also protect the environment and prevent people from building properties in waterways and streams and canals, which currently happens. All of this is made worse by not using legislation and urban management tools such as land use planning and building permitting in a constructive manner.
AF: Could you describe Freetown’s property tax reform efforts, and the outcomes you’ve seen, in the overall context of municipal fiscal health?
YA: We worked on this property tax reform moving from 37,000 properties in the database of a city that’s a capital city with at least 1.2 to 1.5 million people—37,000 properties. When I came in, it was clear that that was not reflective of reality, but also the manual system that they operated, literally with a ledger book, was not really fit for purpose in the 21st century.
One of our 19 targets is to increase property tax income fivefold. To go about doing that, we secured funding and partnerships to digitize. We changed from an area-based system to a point-based system. We worked on that by taking a satellite image of the entire city and building an algorithm to give weightings to features [like roofs, windows, and location], then comparing that against a database of 3,000 properties whose values were determined by real charter surveyors. We got the old-type assessment done. We were able to identify outliers and refine the model and eventually build a model which we now use as our property base.
Through that process, we moved from 37,000 properties to over 120,000 properties. That meant we were able to meet our target of increasing our property tax revenue from [$425,000 to over $2 million]. That in itself is the pathway to sustainability and being able to invest.
A big part of fiscal health is that sustainability, but . . . unfortunately, the Ministry of Local Government [halted collections while developing national tax reform guidelines]. We were without revenue for about a year. We have started re-collecting, but as you can imagine, compliance levels will take a long time to recover.
AF: Where do you find inspiration in the face of so many challenges?
YA: From the fact that we have been able to make a difference in the lives of Freetonians. We’ve been able to test and to see how much can be achieved if one is given the space to do so. We know that so much is possible and so we keep going.
Anthony Flint is a senior fellow at the Lincoln Institute, host of the Land Matters podcast, and a contributing editor to Land Lines.
Lead image: Mayor Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr. Credit: Courtesy photo.
Graduate Student Fellowships
2023 C. Lowell Harriss Dissertation Fellowship Program
The Lincoln Institute's C. Lowell Harriss Dissertation Fellowship Program assists PhD students whose research complements the Institute's interest in property valuation and taxation. The program provides an important link between the Institute's educational mission and its research objectives by supporting scholars early in their careers.
The application deadline is 6:00 p.m. EST on March 3, 2023.
New Book “Property Tax in Asia” Provides the First Comprehensive Analysis of the Property Tax Across the World’s Largest Continent
By Will Jason, September 7, 2022
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The property tax has great potential as a source of local government revenue in Asia, but its implementation has been uneven. The Lincoln Institute’s new book Property Tax in Asia: Policy and Practice provides the first comprehensive analysis of how this essential fiscal instrument has performed throughout the world’s largest continent.
Written by a team of leading experts and edited by William McCluskey, Roy Bahl, and Riël Franzsen, the book provides a comparative analysis and detailed recommendations, with 13 in-depth case studies covering a region that is home to nearly half the world’s population.
“Our case studies of these 13 countries and regions found that methods to modernize the property tax vary widely among them, including how they capture its advantage as a revenue-raising measure and make it an instrument for rationalizing land use policy and promoting social equity,” the editors write.
A resource for scholars and policy makers alike, the book provides the most thorough review to date of the laws, administrative practices, reform proposals, technologies, and political debates that shape the property tax across countries of all sizes and income levels.
The book finds that, in general, wealthier countries such as Japan, Korea, and Singapore have well-functioning property tax systems, although they face challenges—for example, unclear ownership of Japan’s growing number of abandoned homes. In China and Vietnam, which do not allow private ownership of land, local governments rely heavily on one-time land-use fees, which are less reliable and stable than recurrent taxes. In addition, many lower-income countries suffer from narrow tax bases, undervaluation of property, poor compliance, and political challenges.
To represent roughly 50 countries, the editors selected 13 cases in based on the use of the property tax, innovative administration, use of technology, and history with the property tax. The case studies include all the largest economies in South and East Asia, all jurisdictions with recurrent property taxes of at least 1 percent of GDP, and a range of lower-income countries throughout Asia. The cases include China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, the Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, and Vietnam.
Acknowledging that conditions vary widely, the book recommends the following 10 directions for reform:
Develop a property and land tax strategy
Take a comprehensive approach to reform
Clarify the different roles of national, provincial, and local government
Eliminate unnecessary tax exemptions
Simplify the tax rate structure
Rationalize the use of property transfer taxes
Improve the quality of valuations and compliance with statutory revaluation cycles
Improve voluntary compliance with the property tax
Image: View of Mt. Fuji, Tokyo Tower and crowded buildings in downtown Tokyo. Credit: yongyuan via Getty Images.
Graduate Student Fellowships
2022–2023 Programa de becas para el máster UNED-Instituto Lincoln
Submission Deadline:
November 29, 2022 at 11:59 PM
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El Instituto Lincoln de Políticas de Suelo y la Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia (UNED) ofrecen el máster en Políticas de Suelo y Desarrollo Urbano Sostenible, un programa académico en español que tuvo gran demanda en su primera convocatoria. Se trata de un posgrado que reúne de manera única los marcos legales y herramientas que sostienen la planificación urbana, junto con instrumentos fiscales, ambientales y de participación sostenibles, todo desde una perspectiva internacional y comparada.
El máster en Políticas de Suelo y Desarrollo Urbano Sostenible es un programa en formato virtual y se compone de cuatro módulos, los cuales abordan una parte importante de la realidad actual de las ciudades: el derecho administrativo urbano, el financiamiento con base en el suelo, el cambio climático y el desarrollo sostenible, y el conflicto urbano y la participación ciudadana. El programa académico concluye con un trabajo final de máster que permite a los alumnos trabajar de cerca con actividades de desarrollo urbano actuales, como el proyecto Castellana Norte en Madrid.
El programa está dirigido especialmente a estudiantes de posgrado y otros graduados con interés en políticas urbanas desde una perspectiva jurídica, ambiental y de procesos de participación, así como a funcionarios públicos. Los participantes del máster recibirán el entrenamiento intelectual y técnico para liderar la implementación de medidas que permitan la transformación de las ciudades.
El Instituto Lincoln otorgará becas que cubrirán parcialmente el costo del máster de los postulantes seleccionados.
Términos de las becas
Los becarios deben haber obtenido un título de licenciatura de una institución académica o de estudios superiores.
Los fondos de las becas no tienen valor en efectivo y solo cubrirán el 40% del costo total del programa.
Los becarios deben pagar la primera cuota de la matricula que representa el 60% del costo total del máster.
Los becarios deben mantener una buena posición académica o perderán el derecho a la beca.
El otorgamiento de la beca dependerá de la admisión formal del postulante al máster UNED-Instituto Lincoln.
Si son seleccionados, los becarios recibirán asistencia virtual para realizar el proceso de admisión de la Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia (UNED), el cual requiere una solicitud online y una copia de su expediente académico o registro de calificaciones de licenciatura y/o posgrado.
Aquellos postulantes que no obtengan la beca parcial del Instituto Lincoln podrán optar a las ayudas que ofrece la UNED, una vez que se hayan matriculado en el máster.
Fecha límite para postular: 29 de noviembre de 2022, 23:59 horas de Boston, MA, EE.UU. (UTC-5)
Anuncio de resultados: 16 de diciembre de 2022
Details
Submission Deadline
November 29, 2022 at 11:59 PM
Keywords
Climate Mitigation, Development, Dispute Resolution, Environmental Management, Favela, Henry George, Informal Land Markets, Infrastructure, Land Market Regulation, Land Speculation, Land Use, Land Use Planning, Land Value, Land Value Taxation, Land-Based Tax, Local Government, Mediation, Municipal Fiscal Health, Planning, Property Taxation, Public Finance, Public Policy, Regulatory Regimes, Resilience, Reuse of Urban Land, Urban Development, Urbanism, Value Capture, Zoning
The property tax is the linchpin of independent local government in the United States and offers key strengths as a local revenue source. It provides stable revenue over the business cycle, it is progressive when compared to most alternatives, and its immobile tax base permits localities to set tax rates that reflect the preferences of their citizens. Like any tax, though, it faces challenges.
This webinar will describe a set of policies that can address common property tax challenges without undermining its strengths as a local revenue source. Adam H. Langley and Joan Youngman, property tax experts at the Lincoln Institute, will present key findings from their Policy Focus Report, Property Tax Relief for Homeowners. They will outline principles for quality assessment practices and state aid programs; describe how to design targeted and cost-effective property tax relief programs such as circuit breakers and deferrals; and explain the consequences of different types of tax limits.
In addition, Ron Rakow, former commissioner of assessing for the City of Boston and current Lincoln Institute Fellow, will discuss the success of Boston’s property tax relief policies, such as the City’s generous homestead exemption, and its effective efforts to improve assessment practices.
Moderator
Kim Rueben, Sol Price Fellow and director of the State and Local Finance Initiative at the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center.
Speakers
Adam H. Langley, Associate Director of U.S. & Canadian Programs, Lincoln Institute of Land Policy
Joan Youngman, Senior Fellow, Lincoln Institute of Land Policy
Ronald Rakow, Former Commissioner of Assessing, City of Boston, and Fellow, Lincoln Institute of Land Policy
In San Diego, the owner of a newly purchased, median-priced home paid more than $9,000 in property taxes last year, about $3,400 more than somebody who has owned an identical home for 14 years, the average duration of home ownership in the city, according to a new study from the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy and the Minnesota Center for Fiscal Excellence.
A result of the assessment limit contained in California’s Proposition 13, the disparity in tax bills for new and longtime homeowners in San Diego grew by $600 last year alone as property values increased, and it has grown by more than $2,000 in five years, according to the 50-State Property Tax Comparison Study.
Assessment limits restrict the growth in the assessed value of a home for tax purposes, usually allowing a property to be assessed at its full market value only after it is sold. Over time, as the value of a home increases, its owner receives an increasingly large tax break. New and recent homebuyers make up for these tax breaks by paying higher bills. San Diego is one of 29 large cities with assessment limits analyzed in the study. In these cities, longtime homeowners receive an average tax break worth $1,600, a 30 percent discount compared with tax bills of new homeowners.
Produced annually, the 50-State Property Tax Comparison Study provides the nation’s most comprehensive analysis of local property tax rates by calculating the effective tax rate—the tax paid as a percentage of market value—for 74 large U.S. cities and a rural municipality in each state. The study considers property tax exemptions, credits, the accuracy of assessments, and other factors to provide meaningful comparisons of tax rates and bills for residential, commercial, and industrial property. It also analyzes the key factors that drive differences in tax rates among cities.
One of the main drivers of variation in tax rates is the extent to which each city relies on the property tax. In Bridgeport, Connecticut, for example, residents pay one of the highest effective property tax rates on a median-valued home, but they pay no local sales or income taxes. Birmingham, Alabama, by contrast, has some of the lowest effective property tax rates, but its residents pay significantly more in total local taxes than Bridgeport’s—$3,201, per capita, compared to $2,221 in Bridgeport—because Birmingham also relies on local sales and income taxes.
A second major driver of variation in tax rates is the difference in property values in different markets. Cities with high property values can collect the same revenue with a lower rate than cities with low property values. For example, to collect $3,424—the average amount collected for a median-valued home in the study—the effective property tax rate would need to be 20 times higher in Detroit, which has the lowest home values in the study, than in San Francisco, which has the highest home values.
Other factors in the variation of property tax rates include differing levels of local government spending, and differences in how various classes of property, such as residential, commercial, and industrial, are treated relative to each other.
The study found that among the largest cities in each state, the average effective tax rate on a newly purchased, median-valued home was 1.3 percent in 2021, with wide variation across cities. Three cities had effective tax rates that were at least double the national average, and eight had rates that were less than half the average.
Highest and Lowest Effective Property Tax Rates on a Newly Purchased Median-Valued Home (2021)
The study also finds significant variation in effective tax rates for commercial property such as office buildings. In 2021, the average tax rate on a $1 million building was 1.9 percent in the largest city in each state. Detroit and Chicago had the highest rates, at more than double the national average, and Cheyenne, Wyoming, and Seattle had the lowest rates, at less than half the national average.
Highest and Lowest Effective Property Tax Rates on $1-Million Commercial Property (2021)