By Brian Massie, A Watchman on the Wall, A Populist
We are providing a platform to a Lake County resident to express his views on the ever-increasing property taxes in Lake County.
If you are interested in joining our growing movement in Ohio to drastically change our property taxes system, please send your contact information to:
stoppropertytaxes@gmail.com
A Lake County resident writes:
Just wanted to write you with a little bit of a different perspective on the ever increasing (property) taxes here in Lake County.
While the (property) tax situation in Lake County is completely out of control. I rarely hear about it from the perspective of the people who are most at risk. I constantly hear about seniors who are being priced out of their homes. This is terrible and shouldn’t happen, however what no one mentions is that the seniors being talked about are mostly white, have above average wealth, and are already being subsidized by other taxpayers…. So, let’s get to the people who are most at risk. This would be the actually poor seniors that have no wealth and rent homes or apartments. These seniors are actively subsidizing the ones that are constantly being talked about as being priced out of their homes. They pay additional taxes so that wealthier seniors can receive homestead exemptions, utility discounts, homeowner only grants, etc. The poorest of the poor should not be subsidizing anyone, and while the wealthier seniors may have the plight of having to sell their very valuable asset to maintain a higher standard of living, the truly poor seniors are faced with homelessness and living in shelters because of these unconscionable tax increases.
How are seniors that rent and live on fixed incomes supposed to make it? I am a landlord, we have raised rents substantially since 2020. This is not because I am greedy, it is because our costs are through the roof. We need fiscally responsible government, not more taxes that disproportionally hit the poor. Each and every tax that my business is hit with is passed on to our customers/tenants who largely cannot and do not advocate for themselves. Why do the poor need to pay more taxes (percentage wise) than homeowners? Tenants in several municipalities such as Mentor, Painesville, and Willowick already pay a tenant tax, their landlords pay higher property tax rates which means they pay a higher rate than their wealthier counterparts that own their homes.
My tenants are suffering and they are good people, yet their plight is never mentioned. We have had multiple tenants lose their homes this year as they can’t afford rent. It is painful to me to see them suffering. Have any of our elected official or school board members spent a day with Judge Malchesky in eviction court? Have they witnessed the endless line of people losing their homes as a result of their poor fiscal responsibility.
Let’s start advocating for our most vulnerable people, and let’s start holding our elected officials accountable for the damage they are causing to our community through poor fiscal management.
When we asked if we may publish the article, here is the response we received:
Absolutely you can publish it. I agree fully, the single biggest problem is that our government is not run by people with business experience, and they simply are not good stewards of money. We read article after article with them patting themselves on the back for passing audits, etc. Notice they never compare themselves to other institutions. Why are property tax rates in Northeast Ohio double those of southern ohio? Are our schools in Lake County/Cuyahoga performing twice as well as the schools in Columbus? Go further south to the Southern states, our school taxes here are close to 4 times their school taxes… Is our education that much better than theirs? I expect not.
What I can tell you is that they call this area the rust belt for a reason. No right minded person would ever base a new business or major plant in this area. The taxes are simply too high. They can operate elsewhere for far less cost.
Editorial opinion by Brian Massie, A Watchman on the Wall, A Populist:
To all Lake County residents please heed these words:
If you continue to pass property tax levies, you will be funding your own demise.
ANY TAX THAT CAUSES A CITIZEN TO BECOME HOMELESS IS IMMORAL!
Categories: Community Activism, Contributors