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No new sales tax; people suffering enough
To the editor:
Someone needs to tell the mayor to stop making statements to people and making them think (the IRS) will go into people's personal accounts and take their money. This is a false statement, and he knows it. My sister-in-law said this same thing to me a few weeks ago. I asked her where did she get that information from, but I knew better than to ask because they belong to the same church. The mayor needs to tells the truth, not the distorted truth. The IRS will seize all the city's assets, not the individual citizens' accounts. This is the very reason why the city is in the situation is in now because of the distorted truth.
Yes, I'm angry and this is the reason why. You (the mayor) want me to feel guilty about something that I had nothing to do with. The citizens of this town entrusted that our elected officials would do the right thing, and the right thing isn't asking the citizen to pay a added 1-cent sales and use tax even for 15 months. We are getting taxed to death, or should I say, taxed to starvation. The people in this town can barely afford to live here as it is. For the next three more years, the citizens have to deal with the 10 percent increase on the water, 12 percent increase on the sewer and 10 percent increase on the sanitation, not to mention the $5 surcharge on to their bill for the ADEQ consent order. Cities all over the country are doing cutbacks and downsizing. Why can't this one? If we have lost population, why are we operating as if we have gained in population?
Here is a suggestion: Instead of going to the voters on March 13 to add a 1-cent sales and use, tax why don't you go to the voters and rescind the fourth of a cent tax on parks and recreations to pay the IRS? Because all you going to do is keep sinking good revenue into bad ventures, i.e. the golf course, Kress Building, bus station. These areas we have sunk enough money into them for us not to have benefited from them. The other problem I have is the donated money we give away. If the city can't pay the IRS, then it can't pay the Ritz Theater $45 thousand a year, the Chamber of Commerce $15 thousand a year, the Kress Building $30 thousand a year. Don't ask me to pass a tax when the city blatantly throws away thousands of dollars.
Our dollar has very little value as it is in this town -- 9.25 percent sales and use tax, now add another 1 cent and that means our dollar has even less value. Instead of 90.75 cents it becomes 89.75 cents. Not to mention the increased millage tax that the county has imposed on us. And the increase on the value of our real estate assessment.
The people in this city are already suffering. In closing, I will say I cannot and will not support this added tax, and citizens of Blytheville, you should not either.