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Rappahannock. (The above data was taken from the Virginia Review Directory of State & Local Government Officials, 1997 edition.)
The last gubernatorial election demonstrated clearly that the personal property tax is not popular or perceived as fair; many of the same arguments could be applied to the real estate tax. It may well be time for a look at a restructuring of local governments’ funding in the state. A dependence on property taxes may have worked in another era, but not in the vastly different economy and society if the 21st century.
Education costs are pointed to as the reason for tax rates being high, but does that have to be so? For example, Bath County, population 5,100 spends $8,318 per pupil, according to the May 29 Highland and Bath Recorder. Yet the Bath real estate tax is a paltry .50/$ 100 (personal property ,20/$100)!
I certainly do not consider myself anti-education. After all, I owe everything I am to our educational system. Nor am I one who considers courses like fine arts and computer science “frills”-quite the contrary. But I do not think it unreasonable to expect that public monies be spent wisely and efficiently, and that tax levies be fair and not burdensome.
I would like to turn to some of the points raised by Ed McMahon in the May 27 issue in his address to the Sperryville Gateway Committee.
I fully agree with his point that our communities are becoming too homogenized, that the distinctiveness between regions, between rural and urban, is becoming increasingly blurred. I have often said that we might get to the point where there is no use travelling anywhere; everyplace will look exactly the same. Those interested in the points raised here would find of interest The Geography of Nowhere by
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