When the next residential property tax bills go out from the City & County of Honolulu on July 20, Oahu homeowners will get some relief from the upward pressure on taxes caused by rapidly rising home values. That’s only right.

This month, the Honolulu City Council approved two more measures providing property tax relief for fiscal year 2025 (to be reflected in bills sent out next year). These, too, were prudent and welcome.

Honolulu’s government has properly focused on the city’s needs in budgeting for the current fiscal year, balancing necessary costs against rising tax revenues. The City Council’s latest measures, too, reflect current economic realities for Oahu residents, and take the city part, but not all, of the way toward a more equitable tax structure.

The city can, and should, do more to address the distress to local workers caused not only by rising taxes, but by rising prices.The city’s property tax structure provides some opportunities to do so.

Fiscal year 2024 relief has come in the form of a one-time, across-the-board $350 property tax credit, deducted automatically from the tax bills of those who qualify.

In June, the City Council showed concern for renters on Oahu as well, by adjusting the “Residential A” property tax rate, which applies to homes rented to longterm tenants. The rate has been lowered for the first $1 million in value for these homes, dropping from $4.50 per $1,000 to $4 per $1,000 — $500 tax reduction on a $1 million home. Acknowledging that assessed values of many modest homes on Oahu now approach $1 million, it’s an effort to keep rents from rising along with taxes, and must be monitored to show that it does just that.

The two bills passed by the City Council this month extend relief to homeowners with relatively limited incomes, and to seniors.

Bill 40 raises the current $100,000 exemption to residential property tax for homeowners under age 65 to $120,000. For an owner over 65, the senior exemption increases from $140,000 to $160,000.

Greater relief comes from Bill 37, which caps the maximum property tax paid by households with limited incomes — raising the income threshold to $80,000 from the current $60,000, and capping property tax at 3% of income. For a household taking in $80,000, the max property tax will be $2,400 — a potential $680 tax break on a $1 million property.

Targeting tax breaks for those in need is the prudent path, both less costly and more effective that across-the-board cuts. Income-based caps will only be available to homeowners who apply for them — and the deadline for doing that is Sept. 30.

Going forward, the city must cast a wide net, studying purchase and ownership patterns to best adjust its tax structure, as it will with a study of Honolulu’s vacant homes this summer. On Oahu, 34,253 housing units sat empty in Honolulu County, according to the 2020 U.S. Census. That is almost one-tenth of Oahu’s housing stock — an unacceptable number in one of the most unaffordable and housing-insecure places to live in the U.S.

City officials are contracting out a study to determine why so many homes are vacant, and how a specific tax on vacant residential properties could benefit Honolulu’s many residents who lack suitable housing. Benefits to be explored should include contributions to a housing fund, discouraging the “hoarding” of empty properties and encouraging owners to rent these properties to Hawaii households.

The study, which is now due in August after the city pushed back its initial July release, will be paid for using federal pandemic relief funding, and will include consideration of costs to the city, as well. That’s fair. Once the city has a better background on the issue, it must act.