Quezon City to honor top taxpayers on Oct 9

MANILA, Philippines - Quezon City is staging on Oct. 9, 2009 its biggest and grandest “QC Salutes Top Taxpayers,” a testimonial dinner, in celebration of the city’s 70th founding anniversary.

Now on its seventh year, the awarding ceremony will be the last annual tribute to Quezon City’s top taxpayers under the administration of Mayor Feliciano Belmonte Jr., who will be completing his third term as QC chief executive on June 30 next year.

Mayor Belmonte, Vice Mayor Herbert Bautista, city treasurer Victor Endriga and the members of the city council will lead this year’s tribute to the top taxpayers at the Grand Ballroom of Crowne Plaza Galleria.

“It will be the biggest and the grandest of the yearly awarding ceremonies for Quezon City’s top taxpayers,” according to city administrator Paquito Ochoa, chairman of the QC foundation day anniversary executive committee.

This year, the expanded awarding ceremony will cover all types of business organizations in line with Belmonte’s goal to recognize more than the usual top 20 corporate taxpayers in the city.

To date, there are over 60,000 business establishments and 400,000 real property taxpayers in Quezon City. Their tax contributions earned for the city the prestige and recognition of being the richest local government unit in the country for the past six years.

To be honored for consistently topping the list in the business category for the past five years and for earning the title “QC’s Premier Business Taxpayers” are SM Group of Companies, Manila Electric Co., ABS-CBN Broadcasting Corp., Mercury Drug Corporation, GMA Network Inc., Araneta Group of Companies, Jollibee Foods Corp., Pacific Paint (Boysen) Philippines, IBM Philippines and Citi-bank, N.A.

Fifteen companies will be recognized as top taxpayers in business category for fiscal year 2008. These are Dreamweaver Visual Exponents, Maynilad Water Services, Golden Arches Development Corp. (McDonalds), Ayala/North Triangle Depot Corp., IDC Marketing (Phils.), Nestle Philippines Inc., Robinsons Land Corp., Regan Industrial Sales Inc., Chemrez Inc., Manila Water Co., Fonterra Brands Philippines, Pilipinas Makro, San Miguel Corp., The Coca Cola Co., and Maxima Philippines.

There are 10 companies to be elevated to Quezon City’s Prime Real Property Taxpayers: SM Prime Holdings, Araneta Group of Companies, Ayala/North Triangle Depot Corp., Robinsons Land Corp., Megaworld Corp., ABS-CBN Broadcasting Corp., Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co., GMA Network Inc., Manila Electric Co., and Nestle Philippines.

The top 15 companies in the real property category for fiscal year 2008 are: Citibank, N.A., Metropolitan Bank and Trust Co., Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, Phinma Property Holdings, Pilipinas Makro, Banco de Oro Universal Bank, De Zuzuarregui Antonio, LBL Industries Inc., Bank of the Philippine Islands, Rustan Super Center Inc., San Miguel Corp., The Everliving Co.-Santuarium, S&R Membership Shopping (Price Smart), Mercury Drug Corp., and National Bookstores.