One of the things that annoys me more than anything else whenever the
taxes subject comes up, be it income property or sales, is that the
debaters seldom, if ever, equate taxes with services expected. Some
folks want nice pathways around the lakes to walk, jog, bike, or blade on
- other folks want clean well-swept streets - still others want well-lite
alleys - the list goes on and on. So lets see the tax issue and the
services issue intertwined in an intelligient manner.
Now for my property tax beef - it lies in the way the city assessor
establishes property market values. In the olden days (before their new
shiny computers, anyhow) the assessors had to go look at properties,
building improvement permits, and other comerable properties with eyes in
order to have a basis for market value. Nowadays, it is all computerized
to such an extent that if the house up the block from you sells (for an
inflated price, say) the valuation of all other houses are upped within
milliseconds from the time the sale hits the recording entry. Is this
bad? My suspicion - during the past two market value cycles the
properties the assessor used to judge our house were different -
secondly, on the last cycle my personal windshield inspection revealed
that two of the comparison properties had had building improvements which
may have driven their sales at increased prices. These two instances,
suggest to me that the 'process' is unfair, that objective standards are
nedded, that the assessor had too much lattitude. Of lesser gripe - when
I asked the assessor exactly how their 'system' worked I got much mumbo
gumbo. Were I a shrewd accountant or money lawyer I suppose the mumbo
gumbo would have been intelligible.
>Adam writes:
>
>>I'm really tempted to vent on these admitted liberals writing in to
>>complain about the property tax increases. Your votes and your support
>>have served to amplify an ongoing problem - I would say crisis. As
>>Steve Minn pointed out, we haven't even seen the bill for the new
>>library.
>
>Actually, it was this admitted liberal who pointed that out.
>
>It's good to restrain one's gloating - for I think that lust to gloat is
>what has kept city Republicans an (electorally) endangered species. As I
>admitted in my original post, I'd always love my tax bill to be lower - that
>doesn't make me a hypocrite, just human. But unlike most Republicans whose
>rhetoric I hear/read, I consider what we get with taxes - you don't always
>go with the low bidder and you don't always prosper in a low-tax climate.
>(Sorry, I don't equate my tax level with "freedom," as many GOPers do.)
>
>That's not to say there isn't much stupid spending I wish my DFL council
>hadn't done - you all know about those silly TIF deals. However, I have yet
>to see conservatives such as Adam make a convincing case that they could
>both restrain spending and intelligently encourage city development through
>reasonable public investments. Simply put, the city GOP hasn't even come
>close to offering a palatable alternative - instead, we get mini-Rod Gramses
>clearly not in tune with city voters. It's no fun having to vote for
>reckless spenders, but the GOP in the last several years has only offered
>the alternative of feckless social conservatives and fiscal unsophisticates
>even more out of touch with the city public than the institutional DFL is.
>
>There's a reason the last two non-DFL council members have been
>independents, not Republicans.
>
>David Brauer
>King Field - Ward 10
>
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Jack Ferman
Minneapolis, MN
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
