Here comes The Weekly Junction – it’s fearless, free, balanced and fair.
The message is direct and clear.
Walang kinikilingan! Walang kinatatakutan!
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The cost for a curbside trash collection of one 96-gallon cart is $30 per month. Collection is done weekly and some customers could hardly fill their carts up on collection days. Their carts are nearly empty.
The Guam Solid Waste Authority should offer choices to single family homes that pay $30 a month for small amount of trash. A curbside trash customer should be given the option to have his trash collected every other week or to get a smaller cart for a minimal fee of $15 a month. How helpful it would be for a family to save $15 a month.
$15 could buy a case of chicken leg quarters or a 12-pack of domestic beer.
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I recently got a notice from the Real Property Tax Division saying that “our records indicate that you owe real property taxes to the Government of Guam x x x.”
I know I owe nothing but I also know that the government has the power to expropriate or take possession of a real property for unpaid taxes. I then decided to take a day-off to visit the RPTD office.
There were many people when I got to the office. I would like to think that they, too, received similar notice from RPTD.
One kababayan was extremely upset. While showing receipts to the people in line, he said “they told me I owe taxes ten years ago but it’s a good thing I did keep all my receipts. I wanna slap these on their faces.”
I was finally called after waiting for almost two hours. I handed the notice over to the employee who was assisting me. He keyed in several numbers in his computer and in just a few seconds, he told me “you don’t owe any real property tax. Then he wrote “all clear” on the notice.
A waste of time? Not at all.
I have discovered one truth: RPTD’s records are unreliable.
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News headline: Patient loses leg due to ‘wrong’ doc’s advice.
At the same hospital, my friend was told to have a heart problem when he was admitted. With the prodding of his wife, he went to Manila to get a second opinion.
In Manila, the doctors found nothing wrong with his heart.
He had acute kidney failure!
