The Department of Collections shall have the power and its duty shall be to perform the following functions:

(a) Collection of Real Estate and Personal Property Taxes-Billing. It shall collect all real estate and personal property taxes, penalties and interest due the City. All bills for such taxes shall be prepared in accordance with the assessments certified to the Department by the Board of Revision of Taxes and shall be forwarded to the respective taxpayers as soon as possible after the receipt of the certified list.

(b) Collection of Income and Other Taxes. The Department shall collect the City income tax and any other taxes which now are or may hereafter be imposed by the Council in such manner as shall be prescribed by ordinance.

(c) Water and Sewer Rents. The Department shall collect all water and sewer rents due to the City. It shall cause all water meters to be read punctually by its employees. Bills for water and sewer rents shall be mailed to the owners of the properties against which they are charged.

(d) Collection of License Fees; Assignment of Employees to Department of Licenses and Inspections. The Department shall collect all fees or charges imposed by or pursuant to statute or ordinance for the issuance by the City of any licenses or permits. For this purpose, the Department shall assign an adequate number of its own employees to duty in the Department of Licenses and Inspections to receive such fees or charges.

ANNOTATION

Sources: The Fiscal Code of 1929, Act of April 9, 1929, P.L. 343, Sections 202 and 203, as amended, and 204, 205 and 206.

Purposes: 1. The Department of Collections is charged with the duty of collecting all taxes due to the City. See Annotation to Section 6-200. It is to bill taxpayers for all real and personal property taxes in accordance with assessments of the Board of Revision of Taxes.

2. The Department is to collect all water and sewer rents and for this purpose is to read water meters and to do the billing. This function has been placed in the Department of Collections rather than the Department of Water since it is a revenue collecting function and should therefore be performed more efficiently by an agency charged with collecting revenues rather than one responsible for furnishing a service to citizens.

3. The Department is to collect all license fees due to the City and is to accomplish this by assigning its employees to the agency where licenses and permits are granted. The latter is required for the convenience of the public and for the strict accounting for City revenues. See Annotation to Section 6-200.