As some of you may know, both School District 51 and the city of Grand Junction are considering raises in their main source of revenue.
That would be property and sales taxes respectively. The first for various new capital projects and the second for a single major capital project of a new public safety facility.
After the Governor's enormous property tax increase of this year which in some cases doubled commercial property taxes it does not seem the best season to be asking.
This is especially true since one of the District's projects apparently envisions a new sports facility to replace usage of Stocker Stadium. Given their poor record with enrollment projections it seems difficult to trust District 51 with yet more money, assuming anyone can afford it anyway.
The city of Grand Junction cannot be happy to find itself possibly on the ballot with another property tax increase at the same time that they would be asking for an increase in their already generous sales-tax percentage.
Does anyone actually save up and buy anything anymore?
While I am more inclined to listen to the public safety building argument, I would want to see a strong commitment from the capital reserves, a guaranteed flow of revenue direct from any new voter approved stream and a specific, concrete endpoint to any temporary method of revenue supplementation.
Our friend Gene Kinsey has a very thoughtful and well reasoned analysis on this topic posted at his blog which you can find by clicking here.
