Bacon's Rebellion

Democracy Thrives in Sunlight

Shearing the Sheep: Fairfax County Tax Burden Surges

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by

James A. Bacon
in

The decade of the 2000s has witnessed an extraordinary growth in spending and taxation at the local level in Virginia. Nowhere does this point emerge more clearly than a chart prepared by the Fairfax County Taxpayers Association that shows inflation-adjusted real estate taxes per household in Fairfax County. Comparable charts for neighboring jurisdictions, I am quite confident, would show similar spikes over the past few years.

Where’s the tax revolt? Nowhere in sight, from what I can tell. Maybe there are so many refugees from New York and New Jersey now living in Northern Virginia that many voters feel the tax burden is nothing to complain about.

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30 responses to “Shearing the Sheep: Fairfax County Tax Burden Surges”

  1. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    The real debate is the level of services people want.

    In Fairfax County people are willing to pay more for services.

    Now I for one don’t really think these services are necessary, or think they could be done more efficiently. I am in the minority however hence why we are Blue.

    The real county to watch this fall is Loudoun. Their budget just increased 16% again while Fairfax was actually flat this past year.

    Finally for the record

    Arlington Blue
    Alexandria Blue
    Fairfax Blue
    Loudoun Purple
    Prince William Red

    NMM

  2. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    those “blue” tax and spend heathens and worse.. they actually vote too!

    What’s a Conservative Republican candidate going to do to get their votes? Lie?

  3. Groveton Avatar
    Groveton

    Larry –

    Here is the camnpaign web sites for the Republican (Dave Hunt) for State Delagate from the 34th District. The former Delagate, Vince Callahan (R), has decided to retire.

    http://www.huntfordelegate.com/

    Taxes are apparently not an issue for this hand picked successor to Delagate Callahan. His candidacy (against Margi Vanderhye) is supported by all the usual Republican “luminaries”.

    To be fair, his opponent – Margi Vanderhye – seems to have no interest in taxes either.

    However, take a look at the web site of Sen. Janet Howell (D – 32nd Senatorial District):

    http://www.janethowell.com/frame20.htm

    Let me get this straight – she’s a supposedly liberal Democrat and she thinks taxes should be low and fair. Taxes are front and center on her web site. She claims to have cut spending.

    Tell me again why I should vote Republican in order to limit taxes?

    At least in the districts (Delagate and Senate) where I live – only the sitting Democratic Senator seems to care at all about taxes. And only she has something of a plan to address the issue.

    Virginia is turning blue because the Republicans stand for nothing. Absolutely nothing.

    And Mr. Bacon – I ask that you use your forum at Bacon’s Rebellion to look at the specific platforms of the candidates for state office in the upcoming elections – at least their stance on taxes and spending.

  4. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    The real culprit is Virginia’s anachronistic tax system, which forces local governments to pay for many the costs associated with high growth rates (new schools, roads, social services, police and fire service,etc.) but doesn’t allow those same local governments to capture any of the income tax generated by the new residents they must serve.

    Meanwhile, the Commonwealth reaps the benefit of job and income growth in Northern Virginia, while Fairfax County and nearly every other Northern Virginia jurisdiction is saddled with the costs associated with economic growth.

    The saddest part is that the economic windfall is captured by the barons of the General Assembly, who disperse it to every other corner of the Commonwealth while crowing about their fervent desire to “keep taxes low.” The word “hypocrites” comes to mind, given that their selfish, craven ways have actually served to raise taxes on those residents who are most responsible for Virginia’s relative economic success in recent years.

    If this were truly a Commonwealth, which means “for the common good,” more of those tax dollars would be returned to the regions where they are needed most, to relieve the burden on local property taxpayers, whose cause you rightly champion – though you wrongly assign blame to the parties responsible for their fate. Northern Virginia will always be a donor region, but outrageous disparity in how much of our citizens’ own tax dollars is returned from Richmond is responsible for the steep rise in local property taxes, as demonstrated by your chart.

  5. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    hmmmm.. is this a message for Conservative Republicans to use to win back the Blue places?

  6. Jim Bacon Avatar
    Jim Bacon

    Anonymous 4:04 p.m., Northern Virginia has been a “donor” region for at least two decades, probably longer. Do you have any evidence that the transfer of wealth from NoVa to RoVa (rural Virginia, really) has intensified in the past five years, thus accounting for the surge in real estate taxes?

  7. Groveton Avatar
    Groveton

    For the record – I did not post the message from Anon 4:04. However, I wish I did!

    Anon 4:04 – Brilliant!!

  8. Groveton Avatar
    Groveton

    Jim:

    Since Anon 4:04 is my new hero I’ll be rude and answer part of the question you asked him / her.

    This is from the following article:

    http://forwardfairfax.com//papers/withdrawals.html

    The key paragraphs are:

    “The result was profound. For example, Fairfax County taxpayers were expected to pay $61 million more in sales taxes dedicated to education over the first two years. The usual school distribution formula would have given them back $53 million in new funds for education; under the revised formula, they were expected to receive only $37 million.

    The reality was even worse: Fairfax County records indicate that the County’s taxpayers paid nearly $70 million in new sales taxes in Fiscal Years 2005 and 2006, and received back only $32 million in new education funds.”.

    OK – That’s not about real estate taxes but “taxes are taxes” – no?

    Also, if Northern Virginia is a donor region, what do you call the regions that take the money?

    Welfare counties?

    I thought Republicans disliked the “welfare state” and wanted “welfare mothers” to “get off the dole”. Funny that this logic doesn’t apply to jurisdictions in Virginia.

  9. Jim Bacon Avatar
    Jim Bacon

    Groveton, You need to go back and study the origins of the school funding formula. It dates back to 1990, if not earlier. As I recall, Gov. Doug Wilder was the prime architect of the formula that would redistribute wealth from affluent Republican NoVa counties (they were Republican back then) to poor Democratic rural counties (yeah, it wasn’t that long ago when poor, rural counties leaned Democratic in Virginia). The school funding formula was a Democratic redistribute-the-wealth initiative. If you want to blame someone, blame the right people.

    Also, while you’re pondering the issue, ponder the alternative to redistributing the wealth: letting poor rural localities continue to pump kids out of their school systems who are ill equipped to participate in the 21st century knowledge economy!

  10. Darrell -- Chesapeake Avatar
    Darrell — Chesapeake

    Did you ever stop to think that one reason your little chart is going through the roof is because all those ill equipped kids left the farm for the big city?

    In the old days, the hillbilly highway ran from the hills to the high paying steel mills and auto factories of the Midwest. Now there are interstates leading to anywhere there is a job. NoVa for instance.

    Strange, I don’t remember any steel mills or auto plants up there. Wonder what they do?

  11. Groveton Avatar
    Groveton

    My point was not to blame either party for the school funding decisions. It was to point out the hypocracy in the present Republican attitudes. Present day Republicans detest “long term welfare receiients”, “welfare mothers” and others “on the dole”. They want the length of time that a person who is on the dole can stay on the dole. They insist that those on welfare look for jobs. They’ll tell you that spending other people’s money is wrong.

    Now those same hipocrites see no problem with welfare on a county-wide basis.

    The think it’s fine for the welfare to go on forever.

    The see no need for the “welfare county” to prove that it has an effective economic development program in place.

    They see no reason why these “welfare” counties should bring their own residential tax rates up to at least 1% of assessed value in a demonstration that they are trying to carry their own weight.

    What will happen to the kids who get a lesser education because their towns and counties can’t (or won’t) raise taxes sufficiently to educate the kids? Or can’t (or won’t) cut other non-educational spending sufficiently to educate their kids?

    I guess they’ll be like kids from places all over the country where money is short and there is no Northern Virginia to rob. Places like West Virginia, places like Utah, places like Mississippi, places like Anacostia in the District of Columbia.

    Some will learn under tough conditions and some won’t. Some will go to college, some will go to trades, some will go to jail.

    Some will live in run down hovels next to Rt 1 and pump gas every day so they can buy food and clothes so they can go to school at all.

    However, besides all this teary eyed liberalism in your argument – the key fact remains that there is no transparency in this process. Who are the donor areas and how much do they donate? Who are the “welfare counties” and how much do they take? What is the real standard of living in the “welfare counties”? What taxes are paid in the “welfare counties”? What is their money spent on?

    And, if Northern Virginia has only been a donor area for the last two years, what did these “welfare counties” do before that?

    This is a redneck politician’s dream.

    “You rich folk give me all that tax money”.

    “I’ll redistribute it good an’ fair”.

    “Now don’t you mind how I do it. You callin’ ole Cletus a liar”?

    “It’s for them poor kids down south – pure and simple”.

    “Just trust me.”.

    Nobody trusts this system anymore. Nobody.

  12. Groveton Avatar
    Groveton

    And you know something Jim – Having children is a choice just like living in a large lot single family house. You rail against people who buy low density homes without being willing to bear the full costs of that decision. Yet you excuse people who have large families without being willing to bear the full costs of that decision.

  13. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    According to some, it costs taxpayers more than $32,706 a year to provide benefits to households headed by individuals without a high school education.

    If a kid grows up in a poor rural county in Virginia without a decent education and there are no local manufacturing jobs – he/she will move to NoVa and other urban areas – for jobs and a better education for THEIR kids.

    Many of these folks need public assistance sooner or later because their jobs often do not pay medical nor pensions.

    And that is what is behind the Virgnia system of inequitable allocation of taxes for education.

    Jim B thinks this has to be a Dem scheme and that most Republicans would not have supported it.

    If that’s true – then does that mean that folks, including Republicans who oppose this concept are.. in favor of…

    1. – letting kids in rural counties fail to get a decent education knowing full well that those kids will go to places like NoVa for jobs and benefits?

    2. – passing a law that says if you are uneducated and from a poor county that you cannot move to NoVa?

    The Education Allocation SOQs (not SOLs) is not a wealth transfer program but rather an attempt to have each kid in Virginia equiped with a minimal education that would help them compete for a job when they grow up and become a taxpayer instead of a consumer of welfare benefits provided by other taxpayers.

    In other words – the SOQs are not about bleeding-liberal do-gooder concepts of correcting wealth imbalances – they are, instead, about a more pragmatic idea of producting a workforce that competes for world economy jobs and produces taxes rather than consuming them.

    One might disagree with how this is implemented and needs to be better done but the basic concept is Republican at it’s core I would submit.

    Aren’t Republicans supposed to be all about teaching folks how to fish rather than how to consume free fish caught by others?

    Yes.. Virgnia could choose to turn it’s vast rural areas into clones of West Virginia but unfortunately – those kids will still come to NoVa when they grow up.

    and like I said.. the only solution I see to that – is to pass a law against illegal rural Virginia “aliens”.

    Enough. What is a reasonable alternative to the current perceived inequities?

    How about some ideas from the conservatives besides “tough sh_t”?

  14. Jim Bacon Avatar
    Jim Bacon

    I am sympathetic to Groveton’s redistribution-of-wealth concerns to some degree. Here’s why. After the last round of the Standards of Learning, which recalibrated payments, a large number of poor counties used the extra boodle from the state to decrease taxes, not increase spending on education. One would expect the poor counties to make the same sacrifices as wealth counties to *educate their own children*!

  15. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    Just a few days ago… I believe either Reid or Darrel posted a url that evaluated counties with regard to per capita tax stress index AND, if not mistaken, it was/is that data that is used to determine the allocation formula.

    Does anyone still have the URL?

    My question is: Is using an index like the one that was posted a “correct”, equitable concept?

    or.. is there disagreeable with the whole idea of using per capita income capacity as the criteria?

    If the idea is to change the system – then an alternative has to get on the table.

    what are they?

  16. Groveton Avatar
    Groveton

    Larry:

    30% of the children in NOVA’s schools have English as a second language. They are the children of generally very poor immigrants -both legal and illegal. So, let’s stop the Bull Pucky about NOVA being unwilling to educate those with an economic disadvantage. What we’d like to see is those children with English as a second language learn English, grow up, get decent jobs and become “donor citizens” instead of “recipient residents”.

    It’s been 20+ years of “donor payments” from NOVA to rural VA. When will those investments pay off? When will the “welfare counties” have received sufficient educational assistance to get themselves “off the dole”. Let’s be honest Larry – the answer is never.

    And the reason that the answer is never is because of what Jim Bacon says in his post. This program went from minimum levels of education to underwriting the artificially lower tax bases of the “welfare counties”.

    If you teach a man to fish, at some point they should be able to catch their own fish. At that point they should ask for neither more fish nor more free fishing lessons. When will this happen?

    The answers are as follow:

    1. There is a full and complete accounting of inter-jurisdictional wealth transfers within the Commonwealth including an accounting of the duration of these transfers.

    2. All “welfare counties” must immediately raise their real estate taxes to 1% of properly assessed value in an effort to carry their own weight financially.

    3. Each “welfare state” will publish a public economic development plan that demonstrated their approach for ceasing to require transfer payments within 7 year or fewer years.

    4. The calculated wealth transfer to any “welfare county” will be capped at a maximum of 2 children per household in that county. Costs for educating children beyond that average will be entirely bourne by the county in question.

    I have nothing against welfare per se. However, I have a big problem with permanent welfare. I also require that those receiving welfare provide a plan for getting themselves off welfare. And I want the welfare funds spent for what they were intended – namely, educating children and providing minimum levels of public safety, not to lower Mommy and Daddy’s tax bills.

    The Republican Party doesn’t stand for anything because Republicans don’t stand for anything. It’s time for that to change.

  17. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    first.. we ought not confuse the immigrant issue with the education allocation formula issue and the dynamics between NoVa and Rural Va.

    But Groveton – how do you know that the current allocation formula is inequitable (to what degree?) and how do you know that progress is not/has not been being made?

    I agree with you about just dumping the money without seeing results; that’s why I support SOLs AND NCLB – and corrective measures if no progress is made.

    High school programs and Community Colleges in rural Va to further target workforce-specific training – like our European competitors do with kids that will not go to college are worthwhile investments – provided there is accountability – in my view.

    I think it IS an issue worthy of a campaign debate and there are clearly philosophical differences that ought to be explored – and again.. I say.. opportunties for Republicans to bring to the table – a more conservative approach that incorporates more person responsibility to go along with the state-supported education allocation opportunities.

    I sometimes think of the liberals as sort of “if we throw enough money at something..it will get better” vs the conservative philosophy of “what he heck are we doing… let’s do something that makes sense economically”….

    I keep waiting for the Republicans in Va to show more substance on issues (like this) that cry out for smarter solutions…

  18. Groveton Avatar
    Groveton

    Larry –

    I see immigration and education related although loosely. The immigrants bring or have children who need to be educated – regardless of how their parents got here. We educate the children of incarcerated criminals, we need to educate the children of illegal immigrants too.

    I don’t KNOW that the current allocation formula is inequitable. I have seen snippets of analysis that demonstrates that it is inequitable. However, there has never been a reasonable accounting. This alone makes me think it is shady. I have also specifically requested such an accounting from politicians running for office in NOVA. They seem disinterested in providing this accounting. I suspect that any such accounting would put the lights on the cockroaches in the kitchen and would put the candidates “in Dutch” with their downstate big party masters in Richmond. I am trying to sping up a grass roots effort to demand an accounting before voting for anybody. Everybody I talk to feels the same way I do – the state is deceptive at best and crooked at worst with regard to the supposed educational transfer.

    I like the SOLs even though most people don’t seem to like them. They may be the most positive aspect of the Bush domestic agenda.

    However, all wealth transfers need to have an expiration date. And I don’t see one for the NOVA subsidy – whether it’s equitable or not.

    The trouble with rural high school and community college programs is that there have to be jobs to take after the schooling is finished. Right now, in many rural communities, I get the feeling that the jobs just aren’t there – education or not. If this is tru, then the educated people need to move somewhere that they can get jobs befitting their education. At the community college level – they should just move to NOVA and go to college here. For all its problems NOVA has proven adept at education. Meanwhile, the politicians in the rural counties need an economic development plan that works for those with substantial education as well as more limited education. We can ship jobs to India – why not SouthWest Virginia?

    Republicans should be demanding an accurate accounting of the wealth transfer. If inequitable, it should be changed. If equitable, it should have an expiration date.

    Of course, that would require that the Republican Party in Virgina actually hold to conservative values. Instead, they are Kennedys in Reagan clothing. The rural Republican politicians benefit as much from the wealth transfer as the Democratic politicians. And they have no plan to substitute conservative ideals for the “free money” of a socialist program.

  19. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    Groveton – we actually are in substantial agreement.

    Rural kids can get educated in their rural counties… at Community Colleges.. which are probably going to be cheaper for them since they can live at home.

    I agree about the India jobs…

    Virginia IS pulling out the stops to get broadband to rural… so now we need those kids to get enough education to compete with the kids overseas who also have broadband jobs.

    and finally, I agree with you on accountability and fiscal responsibility which _should_ be the clothes worn by our Republican friends but if a Dem comes along and does that role better.. so be it.

    I’m just struck by the AWOL behavior of Conservative Republican values when it comes to accountability and fiscal values.

    Most of them have gone SOUTH… I’m hoping to see some of them migrate back..

    I figure if I keep tweaking this issue.. I’ll get a response from JB. 🙂

  20. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    Two observations:

    1. The SOLs are not part of the Bush domestic agenda. That state accountability plan predates the Bush administration.

    2. I will believe this NoVA “outrage” over being a “donor community” for Virginia when those same people make efforts to stop being a “welfare community” for our federal tax dollars. After all, if it is wrong to take state tax money from Northern Virginia and spend it elsewhere in the commonwealth, it must be equally wrong for Northern Virginia to be the recipient of any more federal tax dollars than Northern Iowa, Eastern Michigan, Southern Maine, etc…

    Talk about hypocrisy! Geesh guys, cry me a river…

  21. E M Risse Avatar
    E M Risse

    Great discussion!

    I would add only one thing:

    There is no “Rural Virginia.”

    There are lower density places that are less urban and some nonurban places.

    They exist within the Countryside that is within the three New Urban Regions that are all or part in Virginia.

    They also exist in the two Urban Support Regions that occupy most of the 25,000,000 acres that make up the Commonwealth.

    These lower density places, as my good friend Fahmah Mello points out, serve a very important function by providing a place to live (and some work) for those who cannot find a house, a home or way of life in the more intensely urbanized parts of Virginia.

    EMR

  22. Groveton Avatar
    Groveton

    Anon 9:54 –

    Your arguments are 0-2.

    Bush kept the SOLs despite fierce pressure to drop them. I don’t give him credit for much but I do give him credit for that.

    Getting paid to do a job – even if the Federal Government is your employer – is a lot different than getting money for nothing. Sorry, but the military personnel at the Pentagon earn their pay every day. So do the other Federal employees whether you like it or not. In fact, most federal employees get paid a lot less working for the government than they could make in the private sector. This is particularly true for those in the military.

  23. Groveton Avatar
    Groveton

    Isn’t this the federal form of Virginia’s SOL? Even if Virginia started with SOLs – doesn’t Bush get credit for the federal program?

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Child_Left_Behind

  24. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    Once again, George W. Bush – love him or hate him – has nothing at all to do with the SOL program. It is a Virginia state program!

    The NCLB is the Bush program. The two programs are distinct and have nothing to do with each other.

    And no, the federal jobs are not the only thing propping up the NoVA economy. Were that the case, Hampton Roads would be as big of a “donor region” to Virginia as NoVA. NoVA is also fueled by all of the non-government agency spending that occurs to firms throughout the region.

    NoVA people say they are getting the short end of the stick in Virginia because they examine the ratio of taxes paid to Richmond versus the what comes back to them in terms of state spending.

    If that same logic is applied to the region when it comes to federal taxes and spending, it becomes instantly apparent that NoVA, as a region, is no victim.

  25. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    A bit more on the SOLs and NCLB which are confused sometimes but more importantly – how Virginia compares to world standards.

    The SOLs are Virginia born and bred. They look at scores on a grade and school basis.

    NCLB – No Child left behind basically says that:

    1. – the state must have testing
    (they can be totally flabby or rigorous)

    2. – that testing results have to be done with more granularity to include whites, blacks, those on subsidized lunches and handicapped.

    3. – that ALL of the subgroups must meet the scoring thresholds. (and some folks think this is too tough a standard especially for handicapped and ESL)

    The NAEP – National Assessment of Educational Progress establishes proficiency standards and then maps them to the state tests like Virginia’s SOLs.

    Under the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), states are also required to report the percentages of students achieving “proficiency” in reading and mathematics for grades 3 through 8.

    For anyone who thinks Virgina’s SOLs are tough standards, I would invite them to visit the NAEP site to see the reality and that is that only 1/3 of Virginia’s students – statewide meet those standards – AND most of those kids go to school in Fairfax and similiar well-funded schools and not in many of our rural schools.

    2/3 of Virginia students are BELOW the profiency standards achieved by many other industrialized countries who are training their kids to be formidable competitors for world economy jobs.

    http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/states/profile.asp

  26. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    Wow great disucssion here guys but just to clarify a bit though

    There are three different levels we are talking about federal state and local

    Also before we begin my thesis statement :-p Red areas are “welfare” blue are “donor” purple are “break even”

    On the federal level Virginia breaks just about even which makes sense since we are basically a purple state

    On the state level which has been discussed mostly NoVa is a donor to other areas of the state. Lets look at Education and delve a little deeper. We shall also use the help of Kenton Ngo and his wonderful map

    http://www.kentonngo.com/750volts/2006/12/28/fairfax-getting-the-shaft-in-education-funding-on-a-map/

    The dirty secret of the funding formula for education is that Prince William is in a much better position than Fairfax Loudoun Alexandira and Arlington. See how it is white on the map meaning its about average. Consequently Prince William is still largely Republican and the rest of NoVa is largely democratic.

    The final issue is Local which hasn’t been brought up much in the discussion. This is an area that we can control and what the original graph showed. The amount of money going to Fairfax has been enormous and largely on the back of homeowners through real esate taxes

    The solution to this is to elect a new Board of Supervisors

    Support Baise and the rest of the R ticket in Fairfax 🙂

    NMM

  27. Darrell -- Chesapeake Avatar
    Darrell — Chesapeake

    Reposted for Larry.

    http://www.clg.state.va.us/CommissiononLocalGovernment/Docs/stress05.pdf

    http://www.virginia.edu/coopercenter/vastat/gov/comparative.html

    The VASTATS website has some pretty interesting information. For instance, they list the revenue capacity of each city and county. This the the expected amount of local taxes per capita that can be collected if each government drew the Virginia average from each source.

    They also list each year’s actual collection and population.

    Example:

    Fairfax Revenue capacity $2920.

    Total taxes in 2005: 2,746,242,985.

    Population: 1,010,000.

    Actual tax per capita: $2719

    That’s well within the expected capacity.

    Other areas up north;

    Loudin: RC: 2854 Actual: 2851
    PWC: RC: 1915 Actual: 1965
    Winchester: RC: 1968 Actual: 2094
    Manassas: RC 1797 Actual: 2174

    What about the rest of the state?

    Danville: RC 907 Actual 1170
    Covington: RC 1069 Actual 2027

    Hampton Roads:

    Chesapeake: RC 1317 Actual 1784
    Hampton: RC 912 Actual 1924
    Norfolk: RC 961 Actual 1782
    VA Beach RC 1427 Actual 1739

    About 2 billion comes down here for schools and other state funded operations.

    NOVA’s local taxes make up around 77 percent of their total needs. In other words you typically get state aid for 23 percent.

    Down here in Tidewater, local funds only cover an average of 53 percent of the total. The rest comes from the state. You guys…

  28. Toomanytaxes Avatar
    Toomanytaxes

    The state aid formula for K-12 is a farce. I worked with an economic consulting firm to analyze the statistical relationship of the 2006-2008 Composite Index used for funding public schools to Median Adjusted Gross Income per tax returns filed in Virginia for 2003 — the latest data available in Return 2003 in April 2007 (when we ran the figures). The R-Square is 0.2346 and the coefficient of correlation is 0.4843. I’m no statistician, but those figures strongly suggest that there is a very poor fit between the data and a regression line and the correlation is pretty mediocre at best.

    What this proves is that the residents of Fairfax County are Pig Sh_t stupid because most of them would support paying even higher state taxes for public schools. The entire state aid program is bogus. It doesn’t transfer money from richer areas to help those who are truly poor. Rather, it transfers money from the dumb _sses in Fairfax, Arlington, Alexandria and Loudoun Counties to subsidize real estate taxes throughout most of Virginia. Why we are too stupid to understand this is beyond me.

    I obtained the funding formula information from the Virginia Department of Education’s website. The Median Adjusted Gross Income figures were obtained from ttp://www.virginia.edu/coopercenter/vastat/income/agi03all.xls

  29. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    Darrell – thanks for reposting.

    so what is the truth?

    Those stress indexes look pretty convincing to me… (though I’m suprised that TW/HR are no better off than many rural counties of modest means)

    …but then I don’t take what TMT sez as swill either…

    TMT – is there something fundamentally wrong with the basis used for the stress indices?

    If we can get to the bottom of this – those running for office in NoVa might have to actually answer some ticklish questions for voters.

    Surely those elected and wannabies would not be complicit with a state scheme to fleece NoVa taxpayers .. would they?

  30. Ray Hyde Avatar
    Ray Hyde

    We are looking at $5000 in taxes now vs $3000 in 1981. How does that compare to the percapita net income over the same time period?

    ————————

    “We can ship jobs to India – why not SouthWest Virginia?”

    How many jobs do we have to ship to Southwest Virginia to relieve traffic congestion and growth in NOVA? Aren’t they a reason for higher taxes?

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