Harrison City Finance Committee Meeting on April 21st and Sales Tax Swap Information

April 23, 2011

Dear Patriot(s):

I wanted to update you on what whet on at the last Finance Committee meeting of the Harrison City Council. The primary topic of discussion was the Tax Swap.

It would appear that the primary selling point the council is going to use to entice citizens into voting to increase the sales tax is a community center. Dave Fitton and others have been visiting community centers in Heber Springs, Branson, etc. to see what they have done. He appears to be focused on developing something similar. The projects in these towns cost between $8 and $12 million. Economic development was also mentioned as being included in their "Promise Book".

Aldermen Savage, Sherrell and Crockett told the committee that they have doubts about whether the voters would go for any tax swap. I believe it was Alderman Sherrell who confirmed my prior statement to the council that "the people don't trust us not to raise property taxes in the future".

Alderman Sherrell suggested the council consider a simple request of a 1/2 cent sales tax increase with no swap. Mayor Crockett suggested that the 1/2 cent increase be marketed for public safety. The monies received from the 1/2 cent increase could then be used as the annual budgets for the fire and police departments and then the city could use their original budgeted funds to do the improvements they were wanting. Someone also suggested that some of the 1/2 cent tax could also be used for raises for the city employees. The number that I recall that would be raised with the 1/2 cent tax increase was somewhere around $2.3 million annually.

Chief Murphy said that the ability to give the current officers raises would help with their retention issues and would allow him to hire additional patrol officers. He also suggested that the councilmen speak with me since the Tea Party has a finger on the pulse of the community.

Mayor Crockett suggested that the council wait until Berryville holds their election in about six weeks. The City of Berryville is asking their citizens to raise their sales tax and the thinking is if they can get such a measure passed then Harrison can also.

After the meeting, Aldermen Sherrell and Baltimore did approach me for my opinion. I told them that as far as a swap, they really need to forget about it. Community feedback to us on the issue has been "No Way". As for asking for the 1/2 cent... there is a possibility that the community would agree IF the money was designated toward the fire and police but if the voters found out that some of that money was used to give across-the-board raises to city employees it would not go over well. I explained that folks, such me, in the private sector have not gotten raises in years and that our seniors have not had a COLA increase in more than two years.

Patriots... this is definitely an issue we need to stay on top of. There could be some slight of hand here. The council is very concerned with how to "market" this proposal so it is critical that the BCTP be present at the committee meetings in order to see if we can see any hidden dangers in their plans. I don't want to sound conspiratorial but we are dealing with elected officials and they definitely have their own agendas and we all know their agendas aren't always the same as the taxpayers.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

For Liberty,
Kara Staton
President
Boone County TEA Party