{"id":581993,"date":"2010-05-27T14:58:29","date_gmt":"2010-05-27T18:58:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/seattletimes.nwsource.com\/html\/northwestvoices\/2011968024_salestaxandpropertytaxes.html?syndication=rss"},"modified":"2010-05-27T14:58:29","modified_gmt":"2010-05-27T18:58:29","slug":"sales-tax-and-property-taxes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/581993","title":{"rendered":"Sales tax and property taxes"},"content":{"rendered":"

King County Council\u2019s taxing spree<\/strong><\/p>\n

It is extremely disturbing to me that the King County Council creates expensive ideas, whether it is the legal or the social side of business, and does not consider that there may be too many of these ideas being offered to the public. [\u201cCounty looks to property tax after defeat of sales-tax plan,\u201d page one, May 25.]<\/p>\n

The sad part of it is that when there are hard economic times, such as the current period, the various governmental organizations refuse to do anything other than attempt to force the taxpayers to maintain the status quo by increasing taxes.<\/p>\n

I was glad to see that the County Council decided not to present either the .2 percent sales-tax increase or the property-tax increase to the voters for the August ballot. I sincerely hope there is no change in that voting when it comes to the November ballot.<\/p>\n

Taxpayers are sick and tired of having further taxes imposed on them to maintain the status quo for every one of the programs when so many people are out of work and many are losing their homes. There does not seem to be any will by the government to rein in the union demands or to increase the employee share of health-insurance costs.<\/p>\n

Maybe at the same time, there should be a significant, permanent reduction in all government employees.<\/p>\n

\u2014 John Marthens, Normandy Park<\/em><\/p>\n

Taxes and levies in Mill Creek could sting<\/strong><\/p>\n

Next year, the state budget shortfall is expected to be approximately $7 billion and after November, the Legislature is looking to increase taxes again. This does not include a state income tax. The Legislature did not raise taxes more than it did this year due the upcoming election.<\/p>\n

The King County Council is considering a sales tax, a property-tax increase or a tax transfer.<\/p>\n

In addition to any legislative-mandated tax increases, the following levies are being proposed for the Snohomish County Library, Everett School District and the city of Mill Creek.<\/p>\n

The Snohomish County Library is considering a levy for a new library in the Mill Creek area with a cost of $80 on the average house, in addition to the large increase last year for operations and maintenance.<\/p>\n

The Everett School District is considering an additional levy to add $100 per year to homeowner property taxes. Board members say this is a temporary increase, but seldom is any tax increase temporary.<\/p>\n

Mill Creek is placing on the August ballot a $108 per year Emergency Medical Service levy increase. This is without consideration of an alternative using demand-based staffing at a significantly reduced cost.<\/p>\n

There is a rumor from a fire-service insider about adding a fire station to Mill Creek environs. This could add another $200 per year to homeowner property taxes, not including facilities and equipment.<\/p>\n

In addition to any state-mandated tax increases, the levy increases if implemented could cost homeowners about $500 per year for a total of $3 million to property-tax collections just for Mill Creek, which amounts to about a 12 percent increase in property taxes.<\/p>\n

Considering the current state of the economy, these tax increases are not sustainable.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Will Nelson, Mill Creek<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

King County Council\u2019s taxing spree It is extremely disturbing to me that the King County Council creates expensive ideas, whether it is the legal or the social side of business, and does not consider that there may be too many of these ideas being offered to the public. [\u201cCounty looks to property tax after defeat […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2861,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-581993","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/581993","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2861"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=581993"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/581993\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=581993"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=581993"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=581993"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}