To the editor:
On Nov. 7, Dallas County residents will have the opportunity to vote on a countywide referendum for a one-cent local option sales tax (LOST). If passed, the tax would be collected (in the cities that approve it) on a countywide basis and distributed to communities (again, only those cities that approve it) through a formula based on population and prior taxable valuations.
The one-cent local option sales tax is collected on the purchase of goods and services sold in communities that have approved its passage. We all pay the tax when we buy a taxable item within a community that has passed the one-cent local option sales tax or purchase a taxable item that is delivered or mailed to our address. Tourists, visitors and those who spend money in communities that have passed the one-cent local option sales tax would provide a substantial amount of revenue under this tax.
The local option sales tax would allow communities to stabilize their debt service levy, provide property tax relief to residents and finance capital projects, capital purchases, grant matching funds and building maintenance.
The city of Perry has used LOST funds to purchase fire trucks, police vehicles, snow plows and other vehicles for maintenance; to use as matching dollars for grant applications for the library’s children’s area remodel and for airport improvement grants; and several other equipment purchase that otherwise could not have been made.
The Dallas Center City Council has committed to using more than half of all revenue collected from all LOST funds on large infrastructure projects (like stormwater system improvements, wastewater treatment upgrades, roads and other capital improvements), with 25 percent of all LOST funds received to be applied directly to property tax relief for Dallas Center residents. Other proposed uses are for non-essential community asset improvements, such as constructing a new community swimming pool, a new and modern library, bike trail enhancements and improvements to local parks.
The passage of the one-cent local option sales tax will allow Dallas County communities to have a reliable stream of revenue to benefit their residents at a time when state and federal dollars are becoming more difficult to obtain. The passage of the one-cent local option sales tax will enable municipal governments to provide property tax relief for its residents and reduce operating expenses.
On Nov. 7, vote YES on the one-cent local option sales tax.
Mark J. Powell
Dallas Center
Taxes are crippling to middle- and lower-income people while, too often, increases are made that do not provide true benefits for the average taxpayer. Raising taxes to provide tax relief? And who gets tax relief? These never-ending tax increases are always justified by using phony lip service to give the impression that residents will benefit. Examples that come to mind are the tactics used by Dallas County to promote the new law enforcement center: arrest more people to over populate the jail and use scare tactics to create fear for personal safety in a county that has such a low violent crime rate it doesn’t register in comparison to national averages. Out of control government classifying acts and laws as taxes, that would otherwise be unconstitutional, such as public defender service and healthcare, enabling fines and punishment, also taxes. Bottom line, most people would benefit by using their money to pay for necessities rather than a new park bench or stuff to pretty up a bike trail and millions for a cosmetically enhanced cop shop. I encourage people to seek the truth, actively preserve and protect what they have worked for.
In the first place, the local option sales tax (LOST) is not a new tax or a tax increase in Perry, where residents and visitors have been paying it for 20 years. The measure on Tuesday’s ballot merely renews the tax the benefits of which you seek to dismiss as not among the “necessities,” but most residents see snow plows and garbage trucks and paved streets as necessities and not superfluous luxuries. Bottom line: some people will oppose taxes on principle and in every case, whatsoever the reason proposed for the tax, and you sound like such a one. But Libertarian extremists are few. The vast majority of reasonable people understand that taxes are necessary to fund our schools, our hospitals, our public health and safety, and many other public goods that preserve and protect our quality of life. And that is why the vast majority of reasonable people will vote Yes on the local option sales tax (LOST) Tuesday.
The proposed option is presented as an increase. My message was to encourage people to seek the truth in how their money is actually spent rather than relying on blind faith in possible expenditures suggested by promoters. I was not indicating that all taxation is unnecessary, nor is my opinion extreme. The national debt is proof of lack of fiscal responsibility and failure of the people to control government as part of checks and balances. The tax burden is significant for the mid- and low-income majority that struggles to make ends meet. Reasonable people would agree that their earned income should be available for necessities rather than cosmetic improvements to government property. I’m disappointed in the apparent personal offense you have taken from my post.
I have taken no personal offense in your opinion and hope I have not given any personal offense in my expressing a contrary one. Beyond that, I cannot do much more than repeat my previous comments. The LOST tax in not a tax increase in Perry, and I do not know what you mean when you say it is “presented as an increase.” It has been presented as what it is: a renewal of an already existing tax in Perry. For cities in Dallas County and the unincorporated portion of the county that are adopting the LOST tax for the first time, it will be a new penny-per-dollar sales tax. Taxpayers do not need “blind faith” to know what the tax will be spent on when the ballot language states the facts of the matter categorically. The “cosmetic improvements to government property” that you imply are the sole object of the LOST tax are in fact only a small slice of the tax’ benefits, most of which qualify as essential services for the community. Adherents of Reaganomics and faithful followers of Grover Norquist have been telling us, from the age of David Stockman until today’s Capitol Hill taxcutters, that they want us all to keep our hard-earned money instead of giving ever more of it to the IRS and Big Gummint bureaucrats who think they know better than we do. It’s always been claptrap and still is claptrap. A liveable wage plus benefits will do a lot more for low- and middle-income laborers in the Perry area and the U.S. as a whole than will starving the public sector of the funds needed to deliver our public services.