Posts Tagged taxpayers
Can Anyone Expect a Public Official to Notice?
Posted by Roldo Bartimole in Economic Development, Politicians on April 3, 2010
April 3, 2010… Is there a Cleveland City Council member who can show any moxie when it comes to pursuing a bit of economic justice in this town? Nah. Too much to expect.
Public servants don’t seem to want to provide that service. Seeing justice is out of their line of sight.
Maybe it’s too much trouble too. Maybe they just don’t see the necessity. That happens a lot. They aren’t a very zealous crowd it seems. I don’t sense much passion there. More like bureaucratic. Short on compassion. Where’s Fanny Lewis?
Anyway there seems to be a dearth of people who even think in those 60ish terms any more. It’s a shame. We have lost so much of our passion about what’s wrong. Our city and culture reveal it.
The reason I’m bringing this up isn’t new. I’ve mentioned it before. Likely I’ll mention it again. And again. Probably AGAIN.
Here’s the deal: Billionaire Randy Lerner has a sweetheart contract. It was given to him by former Mayor Michael White and his favorite lawyer, Fred Nance of Squire Sanders & Dempsey. Quite a duo.
We continually pay dearly to see that the Lerner family does well. Since August of 2005, we county taxpayers have contributed $63,867,150.83 to help the City of Cleveland pay to build Browns stadium By the way, it is used about 10 dates a year.
That $63 million represents taxes we paid on cigarettes and various forms of alcohol as of the end of March. We also pay, but it isn’t recorded, 7.75 percent regular sales tax on the $63 million. That represents another nearly $500,000. This, folks, is real money.
Lerner, owner of the Cleveland Browns, pays almost no rent for a stadium built entirely by the taxpayers of Cleveland. A stadium, by the way, that pays no property taxes on the structure. He got the bargain $250,000 a year rent, never to rise. And the city gave the extra bargain of picking up the insurance costs of the stadium, thus the Browns.
As I’ve mentioned before, the city pays the property taxes on the land, which was provided by the city free of charge.
The city pays much more for the land property taxes than Lerner pays – or will ever pay – to rent the whole thing. The city pays more than $400,000 annually. Where can you get a deal like that? No where. Unless you’re very, very rich.
Do you think Mayor Frank Jackson would have the sense to tell Lerner – time to renegotiate the terms of the lease? You got a sweetheart deal, Mr. Lerner. Now, it’s time to pay a just price for use of the facility. Our city needs it. Our school children need it.
Jackson, of course, should have done this a long time ago. But he won’t. Makes too much sense.
Especially since the Browns have a training center in Berea. That means that though the Browns play all their games at the city’s stadium at really bargain prices, the wealthy Browns players only pay partial income (payroll) taxes in Cleveland. Berea gets to share the tax revenue.
You would think that Jeff Johnson or Brian Cummins – two of the more progressive Council members – would say, “Hey, the city’s getting taken. Time to renegotiation with the Browns. Let’s bring Lerner in here.”
Or maybe, Dona Brady or Matt Zone or Kevin Conwell or one of the new Council members.
Is there anyone awake at 60l Lakeside? Guess not.
Easier, I guess, to add bucks onto residents water bill for garbage pickup.
For more vile details: How Good It Gets for the Lerner Family
Cleveland Tax Should Be Progressive, But It Isn’t
Posted by Roldo Bartimole in Economic Development, Politicians on January 5, 2010
January 5, 2010… Mayor Frank Jackson’s inaugural talk was uninspiring, tedious and lacking the very essence of what it said it was about – the future.
Jackson offered Clevelanders nothing.
We face consistent population loss and job market breakdown. The city’s outlook is dismal. Cleveland has fewer people though more poor people as a percentage of the shrinking population.
This is the situation for most Ohio cities.
But you don’t see the political leaders of the major cities getting together to find solutions. They should be a powerful political coalition.
However, they seem to be each drowning in a downward spiral.
They all need money to operate.
One solution to the problem of revenue is very, very simple.
Get it from those who have it instead of from those who don’t.
What a novel idea.
Jackson’s fee tax on garbage is an example of uninspired thinking. Same as his traffic lights as revenue raisers.
But those “solutions” are easier than a real answer.
How can cities raise more money? They have to get the Ohio legislators to pass authorization that allows the cities to tax on a progressive basis.
What a novel idea.
We cannot keep going to those who have less and least for more revenue. That has been the process with sales taxes and sin taxes, garbage and other fees, and traffic tickets.
What the cities need is a progressive payroll tax, not the income tax that now exists where everyone pays the same rate. For wealth people a 2 or 3 percent payroll tax isn’t a burden. For a family on a limited income, it is a burden. It’s a hardship.
Where is the politician who will sell this state-wide, among cities and their political leaders?
Why should LeBron James – just the use the name everyone knows – pay a 2 percent city income tax and Joe or Jane Jones, making minimum wage, also pay a 2 percent tax. On the first penny they make, too.
LeBron likely has more income that doesn’t pay the payroll tax than Joe or Jane Jones makes in 10 years. Is that fair? Is that wise?
Why shouldn’t people earning big bucks pay a higher than 2 percent tax? Why should someone making minimum wage even pay a payroll tax?
I know how much it hurts. I paid city income taxes when I made so little that I paid no federal income tax. So have many, many others.
When are urban centers going to take care of their people? When are their people going to demand it?
When are police, fire and other public employees – enduring layoffs, low pay and no raises – going to demand that those with high incomes pay a fair share? Why are they willing to give away money that should go to their families to the families of the richest among us?
The lack of concern by these public employees amazes me. Don’t they realize that tens and hundreds of millions of dollars are being given away to businesses whose owners are wealthy but pay city taxes at the same rate they do?
Here are the top ten cities in Ohio. I ask why aren’t the people and their representatives demanding fair taxation legislation that would relieve the financial crisis all these cities face:
Columbus 754,885
Cleveland 433,748
Cincinnati 333,336
Toledo 293,201
Akron 207,510
Dayton 154,200
Canton 78,362
Parma 77,947
Youngstown 72,925
Lorain 70,239
Don’t wait for the Plain Dealer to lead this fight. Their top people benefit richly from things as they are. This is the kind of corruption Terry Egger and Susan Goldberg don’t – won’t – see.
This isn’t a reform they would favor.