
{"id":2420,"date":"2008-04-24T07:27:40","date_gmt":"2008-04-24T15:27:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/2008\/04\/24\/county-schools-need-transfer-tax\/"},"modified":"2008-04-24T07:27:40","modified_gmt":"2008-04-24T15:27:40","slug":"county-schools-need-transfer-tax","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/2008\/04\/24\/county-schools-need-transfer-tax\/","title":{"rendered":"County, schools need transfer tax"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em><strong>By Mike Nelson\u00c2\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p>I know. No one likes to have their taxes raised. Who would?<\/p>\n<p>But sometimes a need is so great that raising a tax is an appropriate course of action. Here in Orange County, we have serious school and park needs. For example, Morris Grove Elementary School, the Chapel Hill-Carrboro system\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s newest school, hasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t even opened yet and already we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re looking to start construction on the next elementary school. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s going to cost an estimated $34 million to build elementary #11. Where\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the money going to come from?<\/p>\n<p><!--more-->And in the Orange County School system, there are serious \u00e2\u20ac\u201d very serious \u00e2\u20ac\u201d renovation needs that demand solutions. About half of the OCS schools were built before 1970 and consequently they are in dire need of repairs \u00e2\u20ac\u201d new HVAC systems, athletic facilities, roofs, etc. But where\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the money going to come from?<\/p>\n<p>On May 6, you will have an opportunity to help us answer that question by voting for the transfer tax referendum. Please take a few minutes to learn more about this referendum before going to vote.<\/p>\n<p>By now you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve probably received umpteen dozen mailings from the Raleigh-based real estate lobby screeching about how the world as we know it is going to end if the transfer tax referendum passes on May 6. Worse, you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve probably received a few robo-calls.<\/p>\n<p>Wow. They\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re relentless. They\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re motivated. And they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re wrong.<\/p>\n<p>There are several points worth making. First, seven or eight counties in North Carolina already have a transfer tax: Dare, Pasquotank, Hyde and others in northeastern North Carolina. Contrary to the scare tactics currently being employed by the Raleigh-based real estate lobby, these county\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s have continued to grow and thrive. The tax hasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t squelched growth or caused hardship<\/p>\n<p>Rather, the transfer tax has allowed these counties to dramatically improve their schools. Dare County, for example, now has the highest per-pupil expenditure of any county in North Carolina.<\/p>\n<p>Second, if this referendum passes, Orange County government will be able to diversify our revenue stream. Currently, most of our money for schools, parks, conservation, recreation and what-not comes from the property tax you all pay annually. By having another source of revenue, we will be able to remove some of the burden from our property tax rate. Now, that would benefit all of us.<\/p>\n<p>Third, unlike an increase in your property tax rate, which you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d have to pay every year, you pay the transfer tax only when you sell your home. For most of us, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s only once every five or 10 years, often longer. In that sense, this is a much easier tax to swallow.<\/p>\n<p>When thinking about the possible effects of this tax, I think of retirees like my mother. My mother is a retired schoolteacher who lives on a fixed income. She and my father bought her house in 1972 for $29,500. As you can imagine, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s increased in value many, many times over since then. When her county increases the property tax she pays annually, it hurts. Her fixed income just doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t keep up with the increased taxes on an ever-more valuable home.<\/p>\n<p>On the other hand, if her county passed a 0.4 percent transfer tax instead of raising her property tax rate, she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d be much better off. She\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d only have to pay that tax when she sells her house. And given the profit she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s going to make when she does sell, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s going to be a reasonably easy tax to pay.<\/p>\n<p>Here\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the bottom line. If the citizens of Orange County pass this referendum, the commissioners will be able to diversify our revenue stream and won\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have to rely so heavily on the property tax. That will benefit retirees and other people of modest means.<\/p>\n<p>For more information, check out <a href=\"http:\/\/www.yourchoice-oc.com\">www.yourchoice-oc.com<\/a> or <a href=\"http:\/\/www.4schools4parks.com\/\">www.4schools4parks.com\/<\/a><\/p>\n<p><em>Mike Nelson is former mayor of Carrboro and currently serves as an Orange County commissioner<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Mike Nelson\u00c2\u00a0 I know. No one likes to have their taxes raised. Who would? But sometimes a need is so great that raising a tax is an appropriate course of action. Here in Orange County, we have serious school and park needs. For example, Morris Grove Elementary School, the Chapel Hill-Carrboro system\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s newest school,&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2420","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-opinion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2420","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2420"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2420\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2420"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2420"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2420"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}