Don't pay your taxes

TWO THINGS I hate:

1. Hundreds of millions of dollars in Philadelphia taxes uncollected due to ineptitude.

2. Having to read about it in the Morning Yawn.

Earlier this week, the Inquirer, in conjunction with the website PlanPhilly, spun an urban novella about tax delinquents. The cause? City inertia, inaction, incompetence and other "in words," such as insanity.

From Sunday through Tuesday, the Inky did to City Hall what pigeons do to statues outside it.

There's pigeon guano outside and bull manure inside. The Inquirer (cruelly?) used words from the mayor's mouth on efforts to collect the staggering unpaid taxes that amount to almost $300 million. The mayor's own words:

March 2009: "You owe it, pay it . . . We cannot be more direct or more clear."

Moo.

September 2010: "This is not a threat; and it is a promise to the city."

Mooo.

March 2013: "We will . . . chase their little asses down as far as possible."

Moooo.

Unhappily for Nutter, the yearlong investigation lands on the front pages just as city homeowners are getting drastic reconfigurations on the value of their homes, with higher tax bills to follow for many. We are expected to pay the new rates while 100,000 properties are tax delinquent, about 60 percent of them owned by investors, according to the Inquirer, which estimates delinquency depresses the overall property-tax base by - gulp - $9.5 billion.

It's true the problem has existed for decades, but reformer Nutter was elected to forge politics-free solutions and reverse his predecessors' neglect. The figures show he has failed. Last month he talked about new technology, new staff and new money to solve the problem. Instead of all the egghead Wharton crap, how about hiring a battalion of Rocky Balboa leg-breakers to knock on deadbeats' doors?

How inept is this city? (Put your hands down, class. That was a rhetorical question.)

Philly's annual collection rate is 85.6 percent, about 10 percent less than the other top-20 cities. If Nutter put as much energy into this as he has into taxing sugary drinks, coddling illegal immigrants and creating bicycle lanes, debtors might have been put on the rack and coughed up the millions they owe. Where are our priorities?

When tax cheats get to skate on what they owe, you and I pay more. (The value of my condo, I just learned, has tripled. Whoopee! Will I do the happy dance when my tax bill arrives? Nosiree! But I am a dunce who pays what I owe, on time.)

You are, too, most likely. How should we protest?

Pitchforks and torches? Nooo! Torches pollute. The mayor would, like, have a total hissy fit. He'd demand that you use glowsticks.

How about this: When your real-estate bill arrives, send back the envelope filled with sand, as in, pound this. Just say no. Just say, "Mayor, after you collect from the 100,000 deadbeats, then come see about me, OK?"

You've heard of tax holidays? Let's have a payment holiday. Let's pretend we're in school and it's too nice a day to spend inside. Go delinquent. Don't pay the bill.

Given the tortoise speed at which the city pursues deadbeats, we'll be pushing up the daisies before they get to us. There's small chance the city will foreclose. Jail is out of the question. If we get hit with late charges - so what? We know from experience that when the going gets tough, the city caves and offers amnesty. Philadelphia is a no-punishment zone for deadbeats.

Are we sick of all this bull? Shall we foment a crisis? Are we up for (nonviolent) revolution? You have 100,000 good reasons to throw your tax bill in the trash.