Sunday, December 30, 2007
Concord Monitor December 29. 2007 12:25AM
Forget, for a moment, the holiday bills due next month. Reflect instead on the senior citizens who struggle year after year with property taxes that threaten to erase Social Security and pension incomes, deplete their savings and force them to move out of the homes where they raised their families and became valued members of the community.
Officials in a high-tax suburb of New York City are pondering a plan that would provide relief by letting seniors pay property tax bills by working as crossing guards, library assistants and after-school tutors, and perhaps even providing advice from their professional backgrounds as accountants and lawyers - all for $7 an hour.
The proposal by Greenburgh, New York's supervisor, Paul Feiner, has sparked considerable interest. Seniors and their advocates imagine filling idle hours with productive work, whittling down their financial burdens, and staying in familiar surroundings. Says Feiner, "People shouldn't have to sell their house, move away to a place with less taxes, leave behind their family and friends."
Greenburgh wouldn't be the first to initiate such a plan. Boulder County, Colo. has had a program in place for two decades and it's proven so popular that there are now 250 applicants for fewer than 100 positions. Communities in Massachusetts and South Carolina also offer a sort of property tax workfare. And it's not so hard to imagine public officials in New Hampshire and Vermont proposing a similar plan to help long-time residents stay in homes even as land values and tax bills soar.
But wait a minute. While the property tax workfare plan has some promising elements (and not just for seniors; what town wouldn't love to have a retired New York lawyer providing advice for seven bucks an hour?), it wouldn't deliver much financial relief. Property tax bills in Westchester County, where Greenburgh is located, can easily top $10,000 a year (a figure that's not hard to imagine in some Upper Valley towns). But the workfare program would allow the seniors who get in to reduce that debt by only about $500.
Some in Greenburgh suspect a political smokescreen. The supervisor, who is elected, floated the idea as officials were mulling a property tax increase of nearly 20 percent for residents in some parts of town. According to The New York Times, one town councilman, Steve Bass, accuses Feiner of using the proposal "to distract from the main problem."
Whatever its problems and political calculations, the idea has some merit. First, it recognizes the importance of a community doing something to help its eldest residents stay in their homes. And by exploring the idea of employing them in public roles, it reinforces the value of keeping seniors connected with their neighbors in ways that enrich young and old.
But the effort can't stop there. The key to providing real property tax relief is to shift the burden of paying for schools and other public services away from the property tax and onto levies tied to residents' ability to pay. If local residents and officials also use some of their energies to bring about such reforms on the state level, that $7-an-hour idea might end up being worth a whole lot more.
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11 comments:
Controlling taxes is impossible unless one controls expenses.
What programs are we willing to discontinue or substantially reduce in scope to achieve lower taxes?
The reality is that Greenburgh is no longer a semi-rural town. We are, like it or not, an urban center - with the same needs for social services as a small city. The Town's largest expenses are for its police department, parks and recreation and its community services. Meaningful spending reductions must come from those areas above all others.
Unless we are willing to reduce the number of employees, both civilian and law enforcement - and accept the consequences of fewer police officers on patrol, the goal of meaningfully reducing spending in the police department is unattainable.
Parks and Recreation and Community Services have been, budgetarily speaking, untouchable. The programs and services they provide are widely perceived as central to our Town's atmosphere of service and community.
Tough decisions. Start thinking about them now - don't wait for the next budget crisis.
More importantly, this is what The Journal News has to say ...
"We call it The Golden Typo (award), the unholy grail of honors that subjectively looks back at some of the past year's nuttier public miscues and the people who committed them."
"Worst Senior Moment: Greenburgh's property taxes rose a whopping 19.4 percent, raising all sorts of alarms, especially on behalf of senior citizens on fixed incomes. Town Supervisor Paul Feiner came up with an idea: Put the old folks to work, so that they can pay off their tax debt. Only the willing would participate and obviously it does not involve hard labor. Still, it's reminiscent of the days when backdoor beggars worked off a free meal by chopping wood. Instead of making the elderly slaves of the state, why not get government costs under control?"
I don't often agree with Reisman, but he's hit this one precisely.
The Suffolk County office of the aging endorsed the proposal as did the NY State Legislature. Governor Pataki did not sign the legislation.
"Governor Pataki did not sign the legislation."
One of few wise moves Pataki has made.
It adds nothing to the coffers to have seniors work it off and what a tax preparer's nightmare. Will they get credit for what they pay into social security? Then the town will have to match that too. These seniors will have to pay income tax on money they are "giving back" to Feiner and everyone else will pay more to make up for the property tax that seniors don't pay.
anonymous 9:32
Here's a news flash there are only 7 patrol officers on the road with a supervisor on most days and nights. On holidays or weekends it usually goes down to 5 and 1, not to comforting is it?
We could keep the same number on patrol and cut the rest of the waste.
WHERE are thr rest of thr force?
Why do they need new headguarters?
You're right here's a good example to save money.
Paul are you reading this.
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Have you ever been to Concord, NH?
It ain't anything like Greenburgh - geographically, demographically or philosophically. New Hampshire's state motto is "LIVE FREE OR DIE" and up there that means freezing to death if you don't work damned hard - whether you're over or under 65.
12/30 10:14PM
You should get your facts straight their are a lot more cops on the road than that.
What is the BS with senior citizens on fixed incomes? Social security has COLA last I checked. People under 65 deserve same slots at jobs. What if i family has a teenager who could help work off taxes? This is discriminatory.
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