In Syunik Marz, the calculation of land and property taxes is conducted by the “Union” NGO’s of the communities in Kapan, Goris, Sisian and Meghri. The communities themselves founded these organizations. For services rendered the unions receive 5-10% of collected land taxes. According to “Meghri Community Union” President Sedrak Hambartzoumyan, in Meghri, where only property taxes are calculated, the 15 communities only pay membership fees to the organization. Ashot Mardyan, Director of the Syunik Regional Administration’s Department of Finance and Socio-Economics, states that in the districts of Goris and Sisian land taxes alone amount to 170-180 million AMD and that the community unions have nothing to do with the collection of the taxes. The communities collect land taxes and forward the numbers to the community union at the end of the month; thus the balance changes. The program shows what each resident owes. According to Ashot Mardyan, these functions have been handed over to the NGO’s on account of the fact that communities can save up to 1 to 1.5 million AMD per year. This is because after the collection process was handed over to the communities from the tax agencies, the communities were supposed to have received quality computers, specialists, a salary and other resources to pay for the program. “An initial cost projection was carried out, showing that each community would have to spend 1.3 million AMD to calculate land and property taxes; even though the yearly land tax in some communities merely amounts to 7 million AMD,” Mr. Mardyan says. He adds that steps are now being taken to hand over land and property tax calculations of small communities to the unions as well. To implement the program the Regional Administration is allocating resources. Not all community leaders have welcomed the fact that community unions have been assigned the responsibility of calculating taxes. Many believe that it has lead to confusion since the community registers and those of the servicing organization don’t always mesh. According to Grisha Haroutyunyan, President of the “Goris Community Union”, such differences do in fact exist. However, he sees it more as a result of what shape the tax books were in when handed over to the community unions. This is because not all community leaders properly conducted the calculation of taxes but also their collection and the registry of transactions. Mr. Haroutyunyan adds that the tax base is being brought up to date with the help of just one computer and that community leaders are keenly interested in the process. There is also the belief that since community leaders are elected by local residents, many turned a blind eye when it came to tax collections to win the favor of voters. Some even say that special “discounts” were handed out when it came time to collect land taxes. One of the fundamental reasons for the discrepancies, according to Ashot Mardyan, is that a great deal of time has passed since the privatization of the land and thus, the probability is also great that the valuation of much of the land has also changed during subsequent years. Thus, a difference has occurred in the minimum defined amount as well. In addition, one segment of land owners, not able to obtain ownership certificates for various reasons, isn’t registered with the State Property Registry (Cadastre). Given that community union NGO’s also calculate taxes based on real estate information provided by regional cadastres, thus, in certain cases, the numbers presented by the communities do not correspond with the numbers of those conducting centralized tax computations. Furthermore, there are certain communities, e.g. Shinouhayr, the largest village in the marz that refused to hand over its tax base data. Thus, this community’s tax calculation isn’t included in the overall listing. In the opinion of community leaders, there are also mapping problems to be sorted out before any correct land tax computation can be achieved. The problem is more evident regarding property tax computation, since over the years many vehicles are no longer in working order but have remained on the books; accumulating large debts. The government decided to free citizens of such accumulated debt if the vehicle in question was indeed past its prime. However, many have seized on this loophole, declaring that their vehicle is indeed no longer operable and has old plates, while in fact the car is still used within the confines of the community. In addition, there are vehicles in former Azeri villages that are still racking up property tax liabilities in the name of their former Azeri owners. In the words of those conducting land and property tax calculations, in order to raise the effectiveness of the services they provide, it is necessary to fund new staff. Thus, they argue, tax collection, alongside of tax computation, will be possible. They also claim that most local residents are unaware of what government privileges exist regarding the collection of land tax and that with additional funding the community unions can also carry out such informational activities. At the initiative of the community unions, several informational bulletins have been sent to land owners, reminding them of the amount of land taxes owed. According to “Goris Community Union” President Grisha Haroutyunyan, this has had positive results – these notices have lead to increased payments.