By the Arizona Free Enterprise Club |
Arizona taxpayers can’t catch a break from their local governments. From water rates and utility bills to property taxes and sales taxes, city councils have spent the last several months approving one increase after another. No matter the justification, the result is always the same: higher costs for the people paying the bills.
Here are some of the top offenders of the last couple of months:
Florence
In the Town of Florence, the town council approved a multi-year water and wastewater rate hike plan that starts with roughly 6–8% increases but compounds over several years into what many residents estimate will amount to around a 64% increase in total utility costs. At a time when families are already struggling with affordability, approving rate hikes of that magnitude is a serious burden on Florence residents. With increases that steep, one would think they’re trying to compete with Gilbert (100%+ increase over 3 years). The increases will start on July 1st, just in time for summer, so get your pocketbooks ready, Florence residents.
Tempe
Tempe has their own slew of problems that deserves an article of its own, self-imposed by mismanagement, obviously. The Tempe City Council recently voted on sending a 0.5% sales tax increase to the ballot for voters in November. This will tax all non-grocery food and is said to give 0.3% to public safety, 0.1% to transit such as light rail and buses and 0.1% to Tempe PRE, a city run free preschool.
As usual, local leaders are putting all blame on the legislature. One Tempe councilmember said, “Let me remind you what we set out to do with this initially: to address a … deficit that was created not by us but by the Arizona Legislature and the federal government.”
Meanwhile, this is occurring while the council has decided on things like a $2 million “Mill Ave” sign. Just plain, silver metal. Nothing special or aesthetic and $2 million is going towards this thing? Right, and it’s the legislature’s fault that they are in a budget deficit of about $24 million. It’s almost as if they didn’t spend your tax dollars on stupid things, they wouldn’t need to keep raising taxes…
