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links for 2007-07-21

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Bart Peterson’s Letter to Marion County Property Tax Payers

Making the rounds via email:

July 20, 2007
Dear Neighbors:
We have taken the first important steps toward long-term property tax reform. The Governor’s order of a Marion County reassessment is welcome news to our friends and neighbors who have been shocked by the unacceptable tax bills issued this month. Thanks to the reassessment, Marion County tax bills will be frozen at 2006 levels. Although this immediate fix is enormously helpful, we will continue to push for a special session of the General Assembly to harness the momentum and frustration of the community and translate that into long-term reform of our broken property tax system.
As community concern has risen, so has the flow of misinformation. It is important that we all understand the facts and causes for the dramatic increases many are experiencing. Some have argued that runaway city government spending is the cause of the increase. This couldn’t be further from the truth. We have been frugal, cutting $83 million from our budget, and have led the charge for government efficiency and consolidation. In fact, the city’s portion of the property tax bill has actually decreased significantly since I took office and the city tax rate is about the same as it was in 2003. Further, city and county expenses were only 2-3% of the total property tax increase for Marion County.
The source of the increase is complex. The tax rate in Marion County is made up of dozens of taxing units that are under the control of independent boards and separately elected officials. The real cause of the property tax increases has been a combination of many factors including:

  • The elimination of the inventory tax, which has shifted the tax burden from businesses to homeowners this year.
  • The apparent under-assessment of commercial property, shifting the tax burden to homeowners.
  • The State capped the “property tax replacement credit” which provided annual relief to property taxpayers.
  • Many school capital projects hit at the same time this year.
  • Mandated state payments for child welfare and juvenile incarceration increased dramatically in 2006 & 2007.

As a result of the reassessment, Marion County Treasurer, Mike Rodman announced that the tax bills are now due on August 10, 2007 and instructed taxpayers to pay the amount listed as due on your tax bill from last year. If you are unsure what to pay, check online at www.indygov.org and click the link for “View your new 2007 property tax.” If you have further questions, call 327-4444. In addition, I have activated a team of lawyers to give assistance during special evening hours.
As I have said from the beginning of this crisis, now is not the time for finger- pointing or playing the blame game. Working together with the Governor, the legislature, and our City-County Council, we will get this fixed.
Sincerely,
Bart Peterson

Boy, I wish he had left off the first sentence of the last paragraph, ’cause that just sounds Republican.

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Indy Star vs. Houston Chronicle: Houston has better readers

I happened to be reading this article in the Houston Chronicle about a gay male flight attendant murdered by a homophobe, and discovered something interesting while scrolling through the reader comments on the article.

Houston Chronicle readers seem to be more articulate and logical (and better writers) than the typical reader of the Indianapolis Star. It was really surprising to read comments from conservative, religious people that are not only grammatically correct but scathing in their view about what the homophobe did and where he’ll end up in the afterlife. After reading the Indianapolis Star reader comments for so long, I had a totally different expectation.

Either the Chronicle heavily moderates their comment section and edits comments from readers, or they just have a better educated populace than Indianapolis does.

I’d have to hunt around to find a really good example, but this one will do for starters. If you’ve never read the readers comments at the Indy Star, hang out and do that one day. Either a disproportionate number of Indianapolis citizens can’t think coherently – let alone write well – or there are just a bunch of nutters who do nothing but comment on the Star all day.

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Iraq Vets Describe Common Civilian Casualties

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The Other War: Iraq Vets Bear Witness:

“I’ll tell you the point where I really turned,” said Spc. Michael Harmon, 24, a medic from Brooklyn. He served a thirteen-month tour beginning in April 2003 with the 167th Armor Regiment, Fourth Infantry Division, in Al-Rashidiya, a small town near Baghdad. “I go out to the scene and [there was] this little, you know, pudgy little 2-year-old child with the cute little pudgy legs, and I look and she has a bullet through her leg…. An IED [improvised explosive device] went off, the gun-happy soldiers just started shooting anywhere and the baby got hit. And this baby looked at me, wasn’t crying, wasn’t anything, it just looked at me like–I know she couldn’t speak. It might sound crazy, but she was like asking me why. You know, Why do I have a bullet in my leg?… I was just like, This is–this is it. This is ridiculous.”

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links for 2007-07-20

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links for 2007-07-18

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Presidential Candidate Mitt Romney Ties Dog to Roof of Car

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I’m a couple weeks late on this story, but it bears repeating. According to Time Magazine, and itchmo.com, Presidential Candidate Mitt Romney tied his family dog’s crate to the roof of the car for a 12 hour trip on the road. You can visit site to know more about the other packages offered by them.

It was 1983 and Mitt Romney, former Massachusetts governor and now presidential candidate, was going on a vacation with his family. The family was driving from Boston to Ontario, and Seamus, the dog, was also coming along for the trip.
Where did Romney put Seamus? Romney strapped a dog carrier with Seamus, an Irish setter, in it, to the roof of the family station wagon for the twelve hour drive. Fortunately, Seamus survived the long trip on the top of the car, although he protested being on top by releasing his bodily fluids on the car.

…

Massachusetts’s animal cruelty laws specifically prohibit anyone from carrying an animal “in or upon a vehicle, or otherwise, in an unnecessarily cruel or inhuman manner or in a way and manner which might endanger the animal carried thereon.”

An officer for the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals responded to a description of the situation saying “it’s definitely something I’d want to check out.” The officer, Nadia Branca, declined to give a definitive opinion on whether Romney broke the law but did note that it’s against state law to have a dog in an open bed of a pick-up truck, and “if the dog was being carried in a way that endangers it, that would be illegal.”

And while it appears that the statute of limitations has probably passed, Stacey Wolf, attorney and legislative director for the ASPCA, said “even if it turns out to not be against the law at the time, in the district, we’d hope that people would use common sense…Any manner of transporting a dog that places the animal in serious danger is something that we’d think is inappropriate… I can’t speak to the accuracy of the case, but it raises concerns about the judgment used in this particular situation.”

Too damn bad that we aren’t allowed to put Mitt Romney down for that stunt. Fucker.

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