I. Metshin held a working group meeting of the District Council for the development of local self-government

(Kazan City KZN.RU, 23 March). Mayor of Kazan, Chairman of the Association of Cities of the Volga region Ilsur Metshin today chaired a meeting of the working group "The balance of municipal budgets and optimization of local government authority" of the District Advisory Council on Local Government Development of the Volga Federal District.

The meeting was held in the meeting room of the Main federal inspector in the Republic of Tatarstan in videoconference format. It was attended by Plenipotentiary Representative of RF President in the Volga Federal District and members of the working group of the 11 regions - Tatarstan, Bashkortostan, Mordovia, Udmurtia, Chuvashia, the Perm Region, Nizhny Novgorod, Orenburg, Samara, Saratov and Ulyanovsk regions.

Ilsur Metshin, as the head of the Working Group, opened the meeting and welcomed the participants. The Mayor outlined the first question on the agenda of the meeting. "In November 2015 changes were made to the Tax Code of Russia - the term of payment of the land tax and the tax on personal property was transferred from October 1st to December 1st. Many cities have already expressed fears that the postponement could adversely affect the performance of the duties of the municipality to the population", - said the Mayor and asked the participants of the meeting about the impact of the innovation on performance of budget revenues in 2016.

The head of the city of Balakovo, Saratov region, Alexander Ovsyannikov was the keynote speaker, he noted that in connection with the postponement the main part of the planned payments of this year will arrive only in early next year, which will negatively affect the performance of the revenue of the 2016 budget year. Deputy Finance Minister of Orenburg region Tatyana Terskova and the head of Uvinsky region of Udmurtia Vladimir Golovin agreed with views of the head of Balakovo, noting that the postponement may lead to arrears to the budget. To avoid this, the working group proposed a return to the earlier deadline of payment of property tax of individuals - 1 October.

According to the Mayor of Kazan, a letter with the request to consider the return of the previous terms of payment of the land tax and the tax on personal property are sent to the State Duma and the State Council of the Russian Federation. The deputies plan to consider this question at spring session in April. Tambov regional Duma has already prepared a relevant bill, Ilsur Metshin urged to support it at level of all subjects. Generalized proposals to amend the Tax Code will be sent to presidential envoy Mikhail Babich.

Also at today's meeting the issue of improving the management mechanism of tax and non-tax revenues received by the local budgets was discussed. "Unfortunately, changes in federal legislation often lead to a decrease in the collection of taxes to local budgets. This is because many of the changes are made without taking into account the views of municipalities", - I. Metshin said.

The mayor of Samara Oleg Fursov said about pressing problems in this area in his report. According to him, today the concern of the local authorities is the lack of taxpayers' obligation to submit quarterly calculations on advance payments for land tax and the absence of a list of restricted and withdrawn from circulation land.

Chairman of the Orenburg City Council Andrei Shevchenko and Head of the Department of taxation of individuals of the Office of the Russian Federal Tax Service of Nizhny Novgorod Region Svetlana Ignatieva drew attention to the declarative nature of the registration of ownership of objects of capital construction, the lack of methods for calculating the cadastral value of construction in progress, an incorrect definition of the cadastral value of land and the inadequacy of its actual use, the amount of deductions for the tax on personal property (50 sq.m).

The working group members expressed their ideas on all these issues. Thus, it is proposed to make the calculation of the land tax, taking into account factors to increase the rates, in case of capital construction objects are not drawn in the property after the expiration of 10 years from the date of land for housing construction. There were also initiatives to toughen the terms of putting into operation, to develop techniques for the calculation of the cadastral value of construction in progress, adopt administrative sanctions for evasion of registration of property rights and to establish the registration period, reduce the size of the deduction for property tax of natural persons in relation to a residential building less than 30 sq.m.

In addition the working group members were in favor to give local governments the authority to clarify incorrect and irrelevant information in the state cadastre of real estate and tax offenses equate to breach of Article 42 of the Land Code of the Russian Federation relating to the timely implementation of payment for the land in accordance with the actual use section.

At the end of the meeting the Mayor of Kazan said that there are the problems in matters of balance of local budgets, and there is a need to declare them at all levels of government.

The meeting was also attended by Secretary of the Kazan City Duma Lyudmila Andreeva, Head of the Executive Committee of the Financial Management Radik Shafigullin, chairman of the Committee of Land and Property Relations Renat Galyautdinov, Head of Regulatory and Legal Department of Kazan City Duma stuff Tatiana Ishchenko.