City Council voted last night to cut the real estate tax rate down to $1.00, the lowest that it’s been in some years, John Yellig reports in today’s Daily Progress. That cut is a result of skyrocketing assessment rates, requiring lower tax rates in order to maintain (or increase) income for the city. Even with the cut, there will still be an effective tax increase for most residents.
Sideblog
- Some nice pictures: Ghost signs of downtown (Via LoCoHistory) and Duncan Brown's 1980 photos of the Downtown Mall. #
- Charlottesville native Will Frischkorn, racing for Garmin-Chipotle, is kicking ass in this year's Tour de France. #
- The Hook calls the Progress on posting a conservative e-mail forward as a letter to the editor when the paper knew it was was plagiarized. Worse still, it's a terrible letter; why publish it at all? #
- DMB's LeRoi Moore is in the UVa hospital in "serious condition" after getting into an accident on his ATV on his farm. #
- Charlottesville resident Adam Nelson has qualified for the Olympics in the shot put. #
- Council is looking at blanketing downtown with WiFi. I'd go with a mesh network—it's cheaper, and my tests downtown show that it'll work just fine. #
- VDOT is reviewing the timing of lights on 29N. The bad news is that some of these jammed intersections are probably just getting more traffic than they can handle. #
- The Sheltons' apple orchard will begin producing hard cider, with the first batch expected to go on sale in the spring. Oh, hell yes. #
- Crime was down 3% in Albemarle and 7% in Charlottesville last year. Statewide the drop was 1%. #
- Courtesy of Google Books, "Rev. Edgar Woods' 1901 Albemarle County in Virginia" (PDF), his 412 page history of the county. I'm excited about reading this. #
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This is a community news blog about Charlottesville, VA, USA, started in March of 2001. It's run by Waldo Jaquith. It has nothing to do with C-Ville Weekly, the newspaper. Feel free to submit a story.
This is excellent news, though as noted it is STILL a tax increase. Any word from the county, or are they still trying to fly under the radar? Perhaps they will, since this isn’t a reappraisal year.
The county is holding a public hearing on its budget tomorrow (Wednesday) night.
<Daffy Duck Voice>
Hooray!! I’m rich, I’m rich, I’m fabulously wealthy!!
</Daffy Duck Voice>
A-HA!
CVilletransplant is former Channel 29 reporter Joe Holden and MAnny Ortez is current 29 reporter Paul Merrill.
Big Al, technically it’s a revenue increase, not a tax increase, though, yes, at the end of the day, the bill is still bigger - a distinction without a difference. I honestly think the city anticipates a bubble pop here in good ole c’ville…and when that happens, they want this in place to decrease pressure for downward assessments. I also think it’s good to move the city and county rates towards each other.
Actually, cville_libertarian, Big_Al is right here. Sure the rate is down, but if it’s not lowered to the point at which rate reduction multiplied by the new assessments equals what I payed before the new assessments, then my taxes have been raised (unless I’m paying less, in which case my taxes have been lowered). In other words, no matter what happens to the rate, if I’m paying more because of higher assessments, my taxes have gone up…and until localities lower the rate to the break even point, they’re raising my taxes.
cvillenewser - we’re all saying the same thing. A tax hike, IMHO, implies a rate increase. An assessment increase is not a tax increase.
As I said, “yes, at the end of the day, the bill is still bigger - a distinction without a difference.”
Yes, yes, and Big_Al did it in the parlor with the candlestick, while cville_libertarian is, in fact, Thomas Jefferson.
My, this is a fun game.
All these people complaining about real estate taxes make me laugh. “Boo hoo hoo, my house is worth $100,000 more than last year. I better not have to pay more taxes though!” It’s crazy to expect to pay the same amount of taxes on something that’s doubled in value. You can’t have it both ways.
My assessment went up too, as I expect my taxes will. That’s the price you pay for having something that increases in value. A tough problem to have indeed!
I think it’s a perfectly reasonable complaint, for one simple reason: Your house’s increased value is only useful if you sell it. If you do not, it’s only a burden. If I buy a house for $50,000 and it is worth $500,000 ten years later, that value change is external; the house is no more useful to me than it was a decade ago. The effect of this economic pressure is to encourage people to sell their homes to unlock that value or escape their real property taxes. This socially destabilizes neighborhoods, which isn’t good for anybody.
What is annoying is when people blame the city for that increased value. There is little that Charlottesville can do about this. With the passage of some new growth-management bills in Richmond, then the area could take some substantive steps to address this problem. But there’s very little to be done right now.