Norfolk breaks bad on tax hike

Norfolk City Council smiles upon us

 Norfolk’s timing is off. 

It was off in 2007. And it’s off today.
In 2007, just as Wall Street was about to implode, Norfolk City Council decided to lower the tax rate by 16 cents, from $1.27 per $100 of assessed value to $1.11 per $100 of the assessed value.

Not 4 cents. Not 5 cents. Not an average or an index. But City Council reduced the rate by 16 cents. Imagine how the bean counters must have celebrated to produce that stellar number. 

It was the best of times. Homeowners saw the value of their lifelong investment skyrocket by almost 30 percent. Many homeowners were flush with more asset value. In fact, many gloated about the rising value of their homes and buying second and third homes with the easy money. 

But something was amiss.

City Council members panicked. Too many of their constituents were screaming about rising real estate assessments.

Norfolk Tea Party? 

Money was good. Cash was king. So Norfolk City Council did what every red-bloodied American politician does in good times – they spread the largesse around the city.

It was good politics. But it wasn’t responsible. It was bad government. But tax payers don’t care about bad government when they are on the receiving end. They do care about bad government when they get short shifted. 

But tax payers are flighty, capricious creatures and politicians respond (usually) because they are Pavlovian creatures who react when stimulated.
Very predictable.

Here’s it’s 2013 and Mayor Paul Fraim wants to raise the tax rate 4 cents. Again, the timing isn’t right. Unemployment is still rampant, though it has fallen somewhat, the impoverished are still impoverished and the homeless are still homeless.

The Hizzoner says he has support on City Council for tax hike.

Residents at a Public Forum support the tax hike, according to press reports. Have you ever known anyone to gladly support a tax hike?

The justification for the tax hike is to finance the construction of four news schools, supposedly.

Even if the tax hike is approved, and I suspect it will be passed and implemented, Hizzoner won’t be here to see the impact. His successor will have to deal with the fallout.

In 2007, City Council made budget cuts while trimming the real estate tax. But it also boosted the personal property tax, the tax on cigarettes, the boat tax and the machinery and tools tax.
You can’t say these tax hikes (apart from cigarettes) were “business’ friendly.
Back then, the Tea Party, a vehement opponent of taxes, took credit for Council’s action. Back in 2007, the Tea Party was a very loud mouth.

But where is Vic Yurkovic, a Tea Party founder and anti-tax anarchist, now?

Will he and his anti-tax anarchists go public and admit that their extreme and violent opposition to taxes put us where we are today?

Councilman W. Randy Wright, a Tea Party founder, said the group "can claim complete credit for what happened today," according to an article in The Virginian-Pilot.

Well, Mr. Wright is no longer on City Council, a casualty of his pro-spending policies – namely light rail.