Monday, May 20, 2013

Deseret News: Salt Lake City School Board Considering Property Tax Increase

Howbout a probably modest tax increase that would inure to the benefit of ALL Ogden City school-kids? 

Impeccable logic
Interesting story from the Deseret News, reporting that "the Salt Lake City School Board is considering (horror of horrors) a property tax increase that would cost homeowners an additional $12.65 per year on a $100,000 home. District business administrator Janet Roberts presented the proposal to members of the board during its meeting last week. The tax increase would raise $3.6 million for the district," according to  D-News reporter Benjamin Wood's 5/17/13 writeup, wherein the financial difficulties of our own Ogden City schools are also mentioned:
Faced with a variety of projected revenue reductions and looming budget shortfalls, the Salt Lake City School Board appears to be approaching its budgetary problems in a straightforward and "mature" manner, or so it seems to us. There's a good reason that Utah law vests school districts with taxing authority. The "grownups" of our Ogden City School District's southerly-situated Salt Lake City counterpart seem be at least willing to consider using it. So what's up with the Ogden School Board, we ask?

All gold @ OHS ('cept for the paint)
The Ogden School District is already poised to gauge pubic interest in a tax increase to continue the "education-mission inessential" operation of the Ben Lomond and Ogden High pools. So rather than taking the drastic step of simply "gutting" "essential educational resources" in our Ogden City Schools, why hasn't our local school board put a similar tax-increase measure on the table to ensure continuation of the highest possible continued educational opportunities for Ogden school-kids?  Has anyone within the Ogden School District even bothered to "run" the numbers on such a measure?  Has our Ogden School District's arguably gross and incompetent past financial mismanagement so deeply "dug in" within our Ogden school system as to create an irretrievable circumstance whereby the OSD's problems can't be cured even by a Salt Lake School District-style tax rate fix?

So how about it folks?  We already know that Ogden City lumpencitizens will "dig deep" in the support of gold-plated auditoriums, so what would you say about "chipping in" to a probably modest tax increase that would inure to the benefit of ALL Ogden City school-kids? 

4 comments:

rudizink said...

LOL! As one WCF reader wryly notes privately: "IMHO It is high time to disband the Ogden District and turn it over to Weber District."

rudizink said...

"Cut
the top, the administration and lets start over at the bottom. It takes
a village and this one, Weber County has been divided to long I say.
Time to come together."
BINGO, RAKEL! Couldn't have phrased it better meself.

Larry Zini said...

Why raise the property taxes? There is about $120 million dollars in Utah of delinquent property taxes owed every year by big landowners and developers. If the legislature raised the interest and penalty on these delinquent taxes, they would be paid on time and you would not need to raise taxes. The legislature is the friends of the greedy scofflaws and the rest of the taxpayers pay the bills.

rudizink said...

Good goin', Larry! Glad to see you're still beating this totally logical political drum!

Will the em>"powers that be" ever wake up and listen to logic?

---sadly... of course not.

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