Another Montgomery Citizen Questions Tax Policy

From the Wheaton Gazette of Aug. 27



Open letter to the county executive and County Council:

I want and deserve a county government that critiques in detail the "wish lists" from the school system, employee unions, organizations asking for grant money, etc., and that is willing to take a position of telling these groups that there is not enough tax revenue being received to do everything they wish to do.

When the income isn't there you should require these groups to submit and live by a restricted but balanced budget that does not exceed the last approved budget by more than the cost of inflation, or failing that, take a strong leadership position and dictate the amount of necessary cuts required to balance the budget. There should also be no room for "special interests" in dispensing taxpayer's money.

My property tax bill increase from 2001 through 2008 has averaged 6.37 percent, which is more than 50 percent higher than the cost of living. The average increase in my taxable assessment has been 14.76 percent for the same period. The average annual increase in the "certified constant yield tax rate" has been 7.3 percent, which has resulted in an annual growth of revenues to the county of 9.4 percent over the same period. In other words, you have increased spending to about two to three times the cost of living rate and still run a deficit!

In a market where food costs have risen by at least 20 percent for the real staples in our diets, housing values have dropped by 15 to 20 percent since last November, gasoline prices have increased nearly 100 percent in the last year, heating oil prices have risen by about 33 percent in the past year, our electricity bill has risen by 70 percent, the savings we have had to plan for in retirement are being eroded by 15 percent or more by the current downturn in the stock market (401Ks and IRAs) and private sector wages have escalated by only 3.5 percent, you find it acceptable to reward the county employees with a 9 percent increase and raise the Water Quality Protection Charges by 40.1 percent.

As if that were not enough, you then choose to levy an 11.9 percent increase in my property tax bill. How much more do you plan to take from the citizens in 2009?

If your aim is to drive the average retired person from the county, you are succeeding.

Delmar J. Luce, Brinklow