THE Quezon City government can now implement its 2016 ordinance that effectively increases the existing fair market values (FMVs) of land, buildings and other structures in the city from 100 percent to as much as 500 percent.
This developed as the Supreme Court (SC) dismissed the petition filed by Alliance of Quezon City Homeowners’ Association Inc. (AQCHI) assailing the constitutionality of the ordinance and lifted the temporary restraining order (TRO) it issued on April 18, 2017, against the implementation of the controversial ordinance.
In a 13-page decision penned by Associate Justice Estela M. Perlas Bernabe, the Court unanimously ruled that AQCHI has no legal standing to file the petition.
“All told, while this case falls under the exceptions to the doctrines of exhaustion of administrative remedies and hierarchy of courts, the Court is still constrained to dismiss the petition due to the alliance’s lack of legal capacity to sue,” the Court said.
“Thus, the resolution of the issues anent the validity and constitutionality of Quezon City Ordinance No. SP-2556, Series of 2016, while indeed of great public interest and of transcendental importance, must nonetheless await the filing of the proper case by the proper party,” it added.
The Court pointed out that AQCHI admitted that it has no juridical personality, considering the revocation of its Certificate of Registration issued by the Securities and Exchange Commission and its failure to register with the Housing and Land Use Regulatory Board (HLURB).
The Court explained that the Rules of Court mandates that only natural or juridical persons, or entities authorized by law may be parties in a civil action.
Failure to comply with the requirement, according to the SC, renders a case dismissible on the ground of lack of legal capacity to sue.
The SC did not give credence to AQCHI’s claim that the petition was filed by its board of trustees, through its treasurer Danilo Liwanag, a taxpayer and a Quezon City resident.
“The Court disagrees. A perusal of the petition readily shows that it was filed by [the] alliance, and not by the individual members of its board of trustees in their personal capacities,” it said.
In its petition, AQCHI said the hike in the FMVs up to 500 percent of the previous values was arbitrary and has no factual basis because the 2016 ordinance contains no standard or explanation on how the Quezon City assessor arrived at the new amounts in the schedule of FMVs.
The group further pointed out that there was no real consultation prior to the enactment of the 2016 ordinance as required by law, noting that only a brief one-day consultation hearing was held in November 2016 before the approval of the 2016 ordinance on December 14 of the same year.
It claimed that the short timeframe from the consultation to the approval reveals that the proceedings were fast-tracked.
While the group acknowledged the need for an increase in property valuation, it insisted that the increase should be reduced and should be implemented on a staggered basis.
Named respondents in the petition were Quezon City Mayor Herbert Bautista and the officials of the city’s assessor’s office and treasurer’s office.
The Quezon City government, however, countered AQCHI’s arguments, saying that 29 public consultations were conducted in barangay assemblies throughout the six city districts prior to the implementation of the ordinance.
It claimed that the increases in FMVs were reasonable considering that the last adjustment was done in 1995.
Furthermore, the local government maintained that the resulting increase in tax due was reasonable because the increase in FMVs was tempered by the decrease in the assessment levels to minimize the impact on taxpayers.
The local government claimed that the assessment levels were reduced from 18 percent to 5 percent for residential classification, and from 45 percent to 14 percent for commercial and industrial classifications.
It also noted that the FMVs in the 2016 ordinance are fair and equitable, considering that those values are even lower than the FMVs in other cities in Metro Manila.