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Karma: 0 |  | Olson: Tax increases nothing new in Crystal Lake
« Thread Started on Mar 28, 2007, 6:11pm » | |
Olson: Tax increases nothing new in Crystal Lake
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Crystal Lake mayoral candidate Lori Phelps’ political inexperience showed when she floated a plan to have a referendum to increase the sales tax in the city.
Mayor Aaron Shepley and the other City Council members know that when you want to increase taxes in Crystal Lake, a referendum is unnecessary. You just do it.
Crystal Lake’s City Council has overseen property-tax increases for each of the past five years.
On Monday, Phelps told the Northwest Herald editorial board that the city should consider a referendum to raise the sales tax by 0.75 percent. She said the increase could generate $5 million in new annual revenue for the city, which could be used for a community center and pool, or other needed projects, such as road repairs, Phelps said. It also would put the city on level footing with Algonquin.
Maybe Phelps didn’t realize that city officials already have added almost $5 million to the property taxes that the city collects since 2003. They’ve been over this ground already.
The property taxes that Crystal Lakers paid in 2006 were assessed at a rate 25 percent higher than the taxes they paid in 2003, the last time that the three incumbent City Council members and Mayor Aaron Shepley were elected.
In real-dollar terms, the owner of a Crystal Lake home with a fair-market value of $250,000 paid almost $150 more to the city in 2006 than in 2003. Unless their home was reassessed during that time. Then they paid more than the additional $150.
In 2003, the city collected about $6.9 million in property tax, according to the county clerk’s office. By 2006, it had increased to $11.1 million. In three years, the city’s annual revenue increased 60 percent.
That might make it tough to persuade people to vote to give the city an additional $5 million.
City officials point out that residents still pay nothing for city services, such as snowplowing, administration and so on. But add in fire protection, the library, and police and fire pensions, and they’re paying more and more every year.
Phelps’ plan to increase the tax burden on everyone who shops in Crystal Lake might fail at the polls. But give her credit for making it a campaign issue. The incumbents in this race didn’t mention any plan to increase property-tax rates by 25 percent when they last ran in 2003.
In fairness, Crystal Lake still is a bargain compared with many of its neighbors. People in many other McHenry County communities pay more for the fire, library, police and other municipal services that the city delivers to its residents. Algonquin, Lake in the Hills, McHenry and Woodstock all cost more, in some cases much more.
But not as much more as they used to.
A referendum asking taxpayers who already are paying the city a little more every year to further increase their taxes seems doomed to fail.
Phelps should take a page from the current government’s book if she’s serious about getting a tax increase passed.
Just do it. Ask for forgiveness later.
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