The Town of Berlin must do better than imposing an unprecedented 29% tax increase on property owners in a single year.
The problems leading to the consideration of this huge hike did not arise overnight. Years of mismanagement and poor decisions caused the town’s present financial quagmire. The citizens should not have to fund the consequences of these mistakes in one year. Instead, the town should focus on crafting a three-, four- or five-year plan to fairly phase these increases to ease the burden on town property owners.
Under an incremental increase plan, senior citizens and others living on fixed incomes can have time to decide their futures. They can then evaluate a way to deal with the looming increased tax burdens or potentially sell their homes and relocate to less expensive locales. Those same decisions will surely be faced by many families.
There are two major issues facing Berlin’s finances — the town’s reserve fund is not healthy enough in the event of a disaster and three of the four town enterprise funds are not self-sustainable and have consequently been drafting funds from the operating budget. This poor practice has resulted in a major strain on the government’s budget.
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DelMarVa's Premier Source for News, Opinion, Analysis, and Human Interest Contact Publisher Joe Albero at alberobutzo@wmconnect.com or 410-430-5349
3 comments:
If they sell the white elephant of a wasted tax payer chicken plant,and 're coup the wasted 3million,that will make up the short fall.town hall needs a major overhaul,starting with the town manager,and the clueless finance administrator with barley a high school education.
Yes 10:09, makes sense to me
10:09, if you are going to criticize people on education you would think that you would at least spell check your post.
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