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Home NATIONALTampere, Turku cities to also hike tax
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Tue, 29 Oct, 2013 12:09:51 AM
Work on building EUR 175 million Tampere tunnel to start next year
FTimes-STT Report, October 29
 
File picture of Tampere city mayor Anna-Kaisa Ikonen. Photo - Str / Lehtikuva.
The city corporations of Tampere and Turku on Monday announced that tax rates would be increased, a decision which follows last week’s similar move by Espoo City Corporation.
 
The mayor of Tampere city presented the budget planning, and said the income tax would be increased from the beginning of 2014.
 
According to the planning, the tax would increase by 0.75%, meaning income tax rate would stand at 19.75% from next year. 
 
“Despite the hike, the tax rate will be still under the average rate,” city Mayor Anna-Kaisa Ikonen said, adding that the service level would however remain the same.
 
“The city is going through a tough economic situation, so there is no possibility for extending any service,” said the mayor.
 
The authority is also planning to terminate 220 employees next year, with the goal of saving expenditure, while authorities also said no new recruitment would replace those posts. 
 
The budget proposal also allocated EUR 175 million to build a tunnel through Tampere beach from next year.
 
Meanwhile, Aleksi Randell, the mayor of Turku City Corporation, also announced the proposed budget on Monday for the next year with the proposal for increasing the tax by 0.75%. With the hike, the total tax rate will be 19.50% from next year.
 
Despite the tax increase, the authority would incur a debt of EUR 11 million because of a number of renovation works including the city theatre.
 
The mayor, however, hoped that the city’s economy would be stable by the year 2016.
 
Randell also urged the government to allocate more money for the city corporations.
 
Earlier, the Espoo City Corporation on October 24 announced that it would raise municipality tax by 0.5% in the upcoming budget with an aim to save EUR 70 million for balancing expenditure.
 
City Mayor Jukka Mäkela, however, assured that the corporation has no plan to terminate employees to cut cost.
 
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