Archinect - News

AIA releases seven-point advocacy agenda for 2024 U.S. elections

2024-09-13T12:45:00-04:00

The American Institute of Architects has released a statement urging action on a number of key priorities related to architecture and the built environment for the 2024 presidential elections following Tuesday’s debate between candidates Kamala Harris and Donald Trump.

"Architects across the country are keen to see greater progress toward key goals related to the built environment and our businesses," 2024 AIA President Kimberly Dowdell says in a preface to the seven-point agenda. "Our top election priorities highlight critical issues including the need for increased investment in affordable housing, aggressive climate action measures, enhanced resiliency against natural disasters and sound tax policies."

"[The] AIA calls on the candidates as well as the incoming new Congress to listen to architects as experts on the forefront of designing a more sustainable future," her statement continues. "Through these priorities, AIA’s members will continue to move the built environment forwar...

India is taxing cryptocurrencies to finance its push for new infrastructure

2022-02-01T19:12:00-05:00

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government has included hefty spending on infrastructure projects in its annual budget, looking to spur growth and improve its popularity just ahead of key state elections. The budget also includes a proposed 30% tax on income from cryptocurrencies.

India also introduced a new digital rupee (after previously attempting a ban on cryptocurrencies) and plans to declare data centers and large energy storage systems as infrastructure in an effort to increase access to institutional funding. Hopes are that the investment in building projects will create employment opportunities which will thus pour money back into the economy. Current forecasts have India’s GDP growing at an 8% rate for the fiscal year.

The country’s Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said the package includes $2.68 billion in allocations for highway expansions and funding for 400 new trains that will be manufactured in the next three years. The money constitutes a major shift as about $4 billion less is being spent on healthcare delivery than was included in last year’s budget. Prime Minister Modi has said very publicly that he feels it is his responsibility to make infrastructure development a top priority for the world’s second-most populous country.

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AIA is encouraged by last minute edits to Congress' tax reform legislation

2017-12-18T20:42:00-05:00

The American Institute of Architects has been one of the many vocal opponents to the House and Senate tax plans, which would gut historic tax credits and harm architecture firms, especially those smaller in size. However, after a concerted effort to lobby Congress, the AIA is newly "encouraged" by some last minute amendments made to the tax reform legislation contained in the House-Senate Conference Agreement announced late Friday night.

In particular, the latest revisions have resolved some of the issues surrounding the Historic Tax Credit. While the House's version would have eliminated it entirely, the Senate's plan would've simply diluted its impact by spreading the credit over five years time. Now in its reconciled form, the tax plan keeps the HTC and improves on the Senate bill's language by adding some flexibility for architects wishing to utilize the 20 percent credit.

The other highly welcomed revision is that the tax plan now allows a 20 percent deduction for businesses or...

The AIA responds to U.S. Congress tax reform bills: "You're making a terrible mistake"

2017-12-04T16:12:00-05:00

Following recent developments the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act made in various versions in both the House and the Senate, the American Institute of Architects announced that it would lobby aggressively against "significant inequities" the legislation currently represents.

Back in September, the AIA already warned about earlier tax reform proposals and called for caution.

AIA 2017 President Thomas Vonier, FAIA now issued a new statement, alarming that with the current legislation "Congress would be making a terrible mistake":

By weakening the Historic Tax Credits, Congress and the Administration will hurt historic rehabilitation projects all across the country - something to which architects have been committed for decades. Since 1976, the HTCs have generated some $132 billion in private investment, involving nearly 43,000 projects. They are fundamental to maintaining America's architectural heritage.

Unfortunately, both bills for some reason continue to exclude architects and other small ...

The AIA sounds cautions on tax reform proposals

2017-09-28T15:21:00-04:00

Wednesday, President Trump and congressional Republicans rolled out a sweeping tax overhaul proposal that would radically slash business taxes, trim the number of individual tax rates to around three brackets, and expand the standard deduction and child tax credit for individuals. The plan has been applauded by Republicans, as well as business groups and the far-right House Freedom Caucus, who argue it would provide the country with a fairer, simpler tax system. Opposing the blueprint, Democrats contend that proposal delivers tax cuts for the rich at the expense of the middle-class.

Today, the American Institute of Architects responded to the tax reform proposals advanced by the Administration and Congressional Republicans issuing caution and releasing the following statement by AIA 2017 President Thomas Vonier, FAIA:

Any tax reforms must do three basic things:

Support and strengthen small businesses, which account for the vast majority of U.S. architecture firms.
Encourage innova...

Where the street has no claim: Presidio Terrace in San Francisco bought after no one paid the street's taxes

2017-08-10T12:33:00-04:00

Tina Lam and Michael Cheng snatched up Presidio Terrace — the block-long, private oval street lined by 35 megamillion-dollar mansions — for $90,000 and change in a city-run auction stemming from an unpaid tax bill. They outlasted several other bidders. Now they’re looking to cash in — maybe by charging the residents of those mansions to park on their own private street.

When the annual $14 city tax bill for the street on Presidio Terrace went unpaid for a little over thirty years, the frustrated municipality held an auction to recoup its lost monies. A savvy couple who live in the decidedly less swanky South Bay snapped it up and now are causing all of the exclusive residents of the street to pay much closer attention to civic matters.

Colorado governor proposes building affordable housing from marijuana tax revenue, mainly to address issues from marijuana legalization

2016-12-19T15:27:00-05:00

A proposal by Gov. John Hickenlooper to direct marijuana revenue toward building affordable housing and curbing homelessness offers a glimpse into the potential the new revenue can have on public services and projects...To the chagrin of pro-marijuana activists, Hickenlooper believes there is a correlation between homelessness, a need for affordable housing and substance abuse, including impacts from marijuana legalization.

Gov. Hickenlooper requested $18.3 million ($16.3 million from marijuana taxes and $2.0 million from the General Fund) toward affordable housing as part of his FY 2017-18 State budget this past November. The Gazette reports that Hickenlooper and his administration “are hesitant to acknowledge that cannabis dollars can have a positive impact on expanding state programs” and that they are currently “adamant that the dollars should be spent only on issues related to marijuana.”

San Francisco rejects “tech tax” that would require big companies to fund housing initiatives

2016-08-04T15:27:00-04:00

“They spend $25,000 per employee per year on perks like free beer and pool tables and massages ... That’s great, but can they spend $1,000 to help the rest of San Francisco survive?” As it turned out, they could not. Representatives of tech organizations reacted fiercely against the tax, saying that it would suppress growth in the industry that has made the city – parts of it, at least – wealthy beyond the dreams of avarice.

Widening the gap between San Francisco's wealthy and poor, the budget committee of the city's board of supervisors rejected on Monday the tech tax, which “would have imposed a 1.5% payroll levy on technology companies that generate more than $1m in revenues a year, including Uber, Google, Twitter and Airbnb.”

California homeowners tend to renovate rather than relocate – here's why

2016-05-06T15:23:00-04:00

California may be a capital of cosmetic surgery, but it’s not just noses and eyelids falling under the knife. A hot housing market is driving buyers to pay exorbitant sums for old, frumpy houses, knowing they’ll pay plenty more to remake them to modern tastes. Others currently own dowdy houses and choose to renovate rather than relocate.

"While the dynamic is playing out in a number of U.S. cities, California’s plight is particularly intense because of Proposition 13, a 1978 amendment to the state constitution. It set property taxes based on 1975 assessments and capped future property-tax increases at 2% a year."

The issue with this, according to the Wall Street Journal, is that when a home is sold in the state, taxes increase because the property is reassessed to its new sale price. This incentivizes homeowners to renovate instead of move, thereby keeping the amount of home listings low and prices high.

More news from the Golden State:

San Francisco launches new "Green Benefit District" program to improve public spaces

2015-08-20T13:08:00-04:00

Through the program, property owners will pay a small assessment that will go toward maintaining and improving parks, plazas, gardens, sidewalks and more. It’s modeled after the Community Benefit District (CBD) program, but geared toward greening a residential area, as opposed to promoting commercial shopping districts, like more conventional CBDs. [...] “This provides a way for us to not only maintain them [the public spaces], but provide capital improvements over time.”

Targeted specifically in the Dogpatch and Northwest Potrero Hill neighborhoods of San Francisco, the impetus for the Green Benefit District plan began years ago, as development rates were quickly beginning to outpace public green spaces in the area. The GBD program would provide a continual source of funding for green spaces in the neighborhood, by taxing local property owners a small amount annually. San Francisco's GBD is the country's first.

More news on development in San Francisco:

"Historic Status" won't protect against demolition

2014-02-04T14:45:00-05:00

What a National Register [of Historic Places] listing really means is a 20% federal tax credit for structural investing, along with any state tax incentives, but that's often not enough to make preservation a more appealing option over razing and starting over. [...] Listing on the National Register certainly gives something of an economic incentive for preservation, as well as a national profile for these sites [...] However, what historic sites ultimately need is sustainable funding.

Can offering free rides invigorate public transit?

2014-01-30T19:27:00-05:00

Last January, Tallinn, the capital city of Estonia, did something that no other city its size had done before: It made all public transit in the city free for residents. [...] One year later, this city of 430,000 people has firmly established itself as the leader of a budding international free-transit movement. [...] What’s less clear on the first anniversary of free transit in Tallinn is whether it has actually changed commuting behavior all that much.

As it turned out, Tallinn's bold move last year to offer free-transit to its residents did not have a very dramatic effect on its own ridership. But the experiment has clarified some subtle issues in public transit:

Free-transit as a "second-best pricing scheme": if a city wants to curb drivers and increase public-transit use, it may be best to de-incentivize driving, rather than incentivizing public transit. Fees on drivers and increased taxes for car ownership may be more effective in getting folks on public transit than offering free rides.
Price affects accessibility, but not necessarily use: This may seem obvious, but without price-barriers, the unemployed could commute through all of Tallinn and increase access to potential employers. Transit ridership grew the most in Lasnamäe, a densely populated area with high unemployment.
Free-rides for everyone may not be sustainable, but it can still be good policy for some demographics. Cities like Hasselt, Belgium and Chengdu in China ha...

Thousands pay Ai Weiwei's tax bill

2011-11-08T20:35:00-05:00

The controversial artist has already received more than 6,000 yuan ($958,000) from more than 22,200 people. While many have sent money via post and the internet, other have resorted to rather unconventional methods -- folding bank notes into paper planes and throwing them into Ai's garden at night.