The Enquirer is reporting that Hamilton County Commissioners will be given three options by county Administrators to cover the 20 Million dollar budget deficit.
The article tries to point out the differences between the choices, but it fails to put forth the main common action: the poor and people who rent will be screwed no matter which plan is picked. The plans are being cooked to make them semi-palatable to Republicans who are Hell bent on shifting the burden of the Bengals Stadium to the poor people of Hamilton County.
The first option is the nuclear option, where nearly every service is cut, so everyone is screwed, well, everyone who can't afford to pay for their own healthcare, police protection, or have enough money to buy justice and don't have to rely on the courts to enforce the law.
The second two options are just shell games to see who will cut the most from what. What both of the plans do is increase the sales tax rate and offset it with cuts to property taxes. So if you own property, you don't get as much of a tax increase as people who do not own property, maybe even none. This is how the poor and renters get screwed.
Sure, Republicans will say Renters will get the same benefit because landlords will pass on tax savings to their renters. BWWAHAHAHAH! That's the biggest laugh in the world, or my attempt to make it appear in this blog post. No, landlords will pocket the tax savings and increase rents the same way the would have without the increase. Therefore Renters are screwed even if they are part of the middle class.
So, the County is again looking to screw the poor and people who rent. Where would you find a majority of those types? If you said the City of Cincinnati, you would be right. Bottom line then, the three plans seek to place more burden on City Residents and less burden (or a least no additional burden) on non-city Residents as long as they own property. I'm gonna guess that Monzel doesn't plan on getting any votes from the poor or renters who don't live in the city, so he can just pretend they don't exist or he hopes they move. Either way, they become poorer to help subsidize the Cincinnati Bengals and Mike Brown.
Welcome to the neo-feudalist movement.
I am tired of Hamilton County constantly playing games rather than just being honest and saying, "We need to raise taxes by [X amount] in order to eliminate the deficit."
ReplyDeleteThe proposal to raise the sales tax and reduce the property tax proposal is nothing more than a "redistribution of wealth" from renters to property owners.
While they're at it, put the stadium fund's property tax rollback on hiatus until the county has a surplus and can afford it.