Look at all ways to make community more affordable – sharing tax revenue and consolidating services
Editor:
I’m glad to have inspired a previous letter writer to engage in debate regarding twisting the message while ignoring the real issues. Everyone is entitled to their own perspective of what the facts are and how they are interpreted to promote their argument for or against an issue.
Some might say a glass of water is half full, while others may perceive it as half empty. Regardless, we are finally making light of and discussing many of the financial inequities that exist in Orleans County to help improve the quality of life in our community.
I too have four college-educated children, all working, productive citizens that received a good education from Albion Central School. They had many excellent teachers who worked very hard to inspire them. I know that teachers contribute much of their own money to make up for the district’s shortfall of classroom funds, because they care for their students and want them to be more successful. I don’t fault teachers at all. I commend them!
I do find fault with the mindset of the Board of Education for thinking we actually needed an “astro” turf football field. Why we needed something like this to benefit so few kids, for so little time makes no sense. The district should eliminate extravagant spending and provide the needed amount of funding to educate students properly rather than having teachers subsidize classroom expenses.
The school district is lavished with generous funding from the state and the county is lavished with generous funding from our sales tax. So what are towns and villages lavished with? The answer is nothing!
Village of Albion residents are paying for 24-hour police protection, fire protection, water and sewer plant facilities, road maintenance, snow removal, Mt. Albion Cemetery upkeep, parks and recreation facilities, ambulance services and the list goes on, in addition to being the county seat.
On top of that, village and town of Albion residents get nothing in return for hosting all the government agencies that take acres of land off the tax rolls, leaving residents to bear the burden for the rest of the county. With no funding from state and county government, this situation is now untenable and should not be allowed to continue without proper compensation.
Medina is thriving because it bears little of the burden for county government, having less property off the tax rolls. Village officials have recently received a $4.5 million dollar grant to improve the downtown area. I commend those involved for their effort and achievement in bringing new life to their village.
The Village of Albion is not as fortunate as Medina with additional grant funding being bestowed upon it. There is more of a sucking sound caused by high taxes and the diminishing tax base resulting from the expanded operations of county government, leaving Albion on life support.
The housing stock in the village of Albion is very old, generally run down and expensive to maintain. It often sells for less because of this. However, with homes selling for less in the village, young couples have the opportunity to purchase a home, often a fixer-upper, to fulfill the dream of home ownership for their family.
The downside of home ownership in the village is the high taxes imposed on home owners to fund not only the requirements of county government and school districts, but the extravagances of both these entities. Land purchases, taking taxable property off the tax rolls by these groups adds insult to injury. Families are having the money they need to properly raise their children taken from them due to excessive spending, resulting in higher taxes.
AIM funding from the state together with a greater share of sales tax revenue returned to each town and village based on the amount of property owned by government is what Albion in particular need to survive. I applaud Tom Rivers for taking up the cause and for challenging county government to go after the additional AIM funds on behalf of residents who are bearing the heavy cost of county government operations in the town and village of Albion.
The consolidation of duplicate services, including departments in county government has to happen to lower costs. The centralization of all essential services such as fire protection, ambulance service and police protection to name a few should be provided by the county, as all county residents require these services. If everyone in the county needs and uses these essential services, the county should provide it.
Shifting services to county government is one way to diminish the tax burden of all town and village residents through the elimination of duplicate services that the county will now provide. The sales tax money that the county holds will be used to efficiently manage and coordinate essential services using fewer employees to the benefit of all county residents.
The merger of the five school districts in the county into one would save nearly a half a million dollars by eliminating four superintendents where only one is needed. Nothing should be overlooked to salvage Orleans county for the benefit of taxpayers trying to improve their quality of life.
For change to happen, taxpayers will need to get involved and push back against the status quo to shape the course of their future. Sure, the easiest way to change things is to move, however that is not an option for residents who choose to stay. Let’s coordinate our efforts to change all government entities in Orleans County to benefit all at the expense of a few rather than benefit a few at the expense of everyone.
Until that happens, towns and villages in Orleans County can only hope for more AIM funding and a greater share of sales tax revenue to offset the high village and town expenses. Let’s take up the cause promoted by Tom Rivers to get the funding we deserve. The effort will be well worth it!
Gary Deiboldt
Albion
