Legislators to serve on Warwick tax study panel
STATE HOUSE – Three Warwick legislators have been named to serve on a Warwick study committee to review tax exempt properties in the community.
Created by an executive order of Warwick Mayor Scott Avedisian, the committee was established to acknowledge that the city has a high number of tax-exempt properties, many of them owned by the State of Rhode Island or secondary educational institutions.
The committee is charged with examining tax exempt properties in the community and making recommendations to ensure more equity among all property owners in the city.
Rep. K. Joseph Shekarchi (D-Dist. 23, Warwick) has been named a member of the committee, and Rep. Joseph M. McNamara (D-Dist. 19, Warwick, Cranston) and Sen. Erin P. Lynch (D-Dist. 31, Warwick, Cranston) have been named to advisory capacities on the panel.
Others to serve on the seven-member committee are Councilwoman Camille Vella-Wilkinson, who will serve as chair; City Treasurer/Interim Tax Collector David Olsen; a representative of the Central Rhode Island Chamber of Commerce, and Acting Tax Assessor Evelyn Spagnolo.
In his order creating the committee, Mayor Avedisian noted that although the city receives some compensation in the form of Payment in Lieu of Taxes (PILOT) funding from the state and annual reimbursement from the RI Airport Corporation and T.F. Green State Airport, the state is still the largest property owner in the city. “If the city received only a portion of taxes that would be collected from these properties, it would help alleviate the burden on residents and businesses,” he said.