Community and labor organizations demanded Tuesday that banks and private equity firms pay California counties millions in overdue real estate taxes related to corporate acquisitions stemming from the economic crisis.

During a protest Tuesday afternoon at JPMorgan Chase's offices at 560 Mission St. in San Francisco, members of the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, the Service Employees International Union, and other groups demanded to speak with a Chase representative.

Chase declined to send a representative to meet with the crowd of approximately 35, whose grievances included the unpaid taxes and other issues, including the costs to counties associated with blighted residential foreclosures, a decline in small business loans, and lost retirement savings due to reckless investments by financial institutions.

"We came here today to get Chase to pay their fair share in taxes," said Dorothy Hicks, an Oakland resident and member of the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment. "They foreclosed our homes and got government money and put it in their own pockets."

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Hicks, a retired nurse from Oakland, spoke through a bullhorn outside the downtown high-rise. Earlier, the building's management called the San Francisco police to ask the protesters to vacate the building's elevator bank area. The group reluctantly complied after police officers explained that they might be cited for trespassing.

Allegations that banks have failed to pay real estate taxes while simultaneously receiving government bailouts are not isolated. In April, San Francisco Assessor-Recorder Phil Ting announced that his office would open an investigation with the goal of forcing banks to pay taxes from multibillion-dollar mergers. At the time, Ting estimated that the city was owed $1 million in real estate taxes.

Financial crisis

The backdrop for the claims is the financial crisis, which hit a tipping point in autumn 2008.

In late 2008 and early 2009, some of the nation's largest banks acquired failing institutions. Under state law, real estate owned by a company that is acquired is subject to transfer tax and property reassessment because the property is considered to have undergone an ownership change.

Transactions cited by Ting were JP Morgan Chase's acquisition of Washington Mutual, Bank of America's appropriation of Merrill Lynch, and Wells Fargo & Co.'s acquisition of Wachovia.

In response to Ting's announcement in April, JPMorgan Chase spokesman Gary Kishner said the bank had submitted the proper paperwork to the state of California documenting ownership changes and would be filing the changes with counties and paying transfer taxes.

On Tuesday, Ting said that his office's inquiry remained active and that he might announce results in the coming weeks. Ting noted that notifying the state of ownership changes is not sufficient and that each county must be alerted. He said his office has been working with the banks in question for the past several months to straighten out discrepancies.

County assessments

Also on Tuesday, Kishner maintained that Chase pays its county assessments. He did not have an immediate answer about whether Chase was current on its payments in San Francisco.

The California Tax Reform Association recently compiled property assessment data from 11 of California's 58 counties and estimated that private equity firms and banks owe approximately $50 million in back taxes. That figure does not include transfer taxes.

The tab owed San Francisco, according to the association, is about $11.8 million. Ting said he planned to contact the association about the disparity between that figure and the city's research. He said that some tax payments may not have been captured by the association because they were still moving through the administrative process.

Any underpayment should be accounted for, according to Paul McIntosh, executive director of the California State Association of Counties.

"Every dollar that is owed in taxes to California counties is important right now, so delinquency by these financial institutions is a significant issue," McIntosh said.