Property Tax Exemption for Charities Explored and Explained in New Book

WASHINGTON, D.C., April 22, 2002 — Revenue-starved municipalities have recently threatened to revoke the property-tax exemption of charities or to demand payments in lieu of taxes (PILOTs), while at the same time the public perception of property-owning charities such as hospitals, universities, and cultural institutions as big businesses has grown, according to Property-Tax Exemption for Charities: Mapping the Battlefield, a new book from the Urban Institute Press edited by Evelyn Brody. In the coming years, economic forces that currently undermine the traditional income- and sales-tax bases will magnify the importance of property tax as a source of revenue, increasing the controversy over exemptions for charities. This volume brings together authors from a range of disciplines to assess what is known about the property-tax exemption for charities and how public perception differs from reality.

The first section lays out the legal and political landscape of property-tax exemption for nonprofit organizations and examines the economics of the issues, with chapters by Janne Gallagher, Joan M. Youngman, Dick Netzer, Joseph J. Cordes, Marie Gantz, and Thomas Pollak. The next section examines the development of the current structure of the nonprofit property-tax exemption and delves into the legal rationales for exemption, with chapters by Stephen Diamond, Evelyn Brody, and Deirdre Dessingue. The third section assesses mechanisms adopted by local municipalities to offset some of the revenue lost because of exempt properties with four case-study chapters by Pamela Leland; David B. Glancey; Nicholas R. Carbone and Evelyn Brody; and Peter Dobkin Hall. The fourth section speculates on future possible approaches to property-tax exemption for charities, with chapters by Woods Bowman and Robert T. Grimm, Jr. The book concludes with commentaries by Daniel Salomone, David L. Sjoquist, Edward A. Zelinsky, Peter Swords, and Richard D. Pomp.

To order the Urban Institute Press book, Property Tax Exemption for Charities: Mapping the Battlefield, edited by Evelyn Brody (April 2002, paper, ISBN 0-87766-706-3, $34.50), visit www.uipress.org or call toll-free, 1-877-UIPRESS.

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