By Rose Laudicina
Staff Writer
Even if the quarter-cent sales-tax referendum gets voted down this Election Day, the Orange County Board of Commissioners is committed to improving the county’s schools and economic-development efforts, and might consider implementing a slight increase in the property tax to do so, commissioners said Tuesday.
In a presentation to the board regarding the campaign to educate the public about the proposed sales tax, Assistant County Manager Gwen Harvey reminded commissioners that they had made it their priority to help the schools as their budgets continued to be slashed, while also increasing the county’s economic-development efforts.
In order to do this, the money needed would have to be acquired elsewhere if the sales tax doesn’t pass, Harvey said.
“Should the voters not approve this, the board will be considering a 2 cent increase in the property tax rate in order to address schools and jobs, which you all felt was your commitment as commissioners,†Harvey said.
The 2 cent property-tax increase would give the county approximately the same amount of funding that would be received from the quarter-cent sales tax.
If passed, the sales tax is projected to generate $2.5 million per year, which would be split equally between economic development and the county’s two school districts.
The county estimates that about 20 percent of the money generated would come from tourists, while a property tax increase, if implemented, would be drawn from property-owning county residents.
Laurie Paolicelli, executive director of the Chapel Hill and Orange County Visitors Bureau, is hoping to entice more visitors to the county with a rebranding of the bureau. She said that Orange County is seeing its tourism increase by about 11 percent and is drawing in more tourism dollars than state and national averages.
County commissioners also heard presentations from Steve Brantley, the recently appointed director of economic development, and Craig Benedict, the director of planning and inspections.
Brantley told commissioners that in addition to recruiting more visitors to Orange County, he is working on recruiting and retaining major businesses by revamping how the county markets available land and buildings to interested parties.
“In what I think is a change, I have been hearing talks all over North Carolina about how Orange County is an economic-development friendly area,†Brantley said.
County commissioners agreed that Orange County being perceived as open and friendly to development is a new notion. In the past, the county has been seen as resistant to new large developments, something the board has been working to change.