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silveradeptHere's a thing that's not anxiety-making and more incandescent anger-making.
The Organization went out for a ballot measure this year. Because an initiative passed by an anti-tax wealthy person passed in the 90s, public entites such as The Organization are restricted to only collecting 1% more in revenue from fiscal year to fiscal year, plus the bonus of any new construction taxes for that year, assuming that the taxing entity isn't collecting its maximum taxing authority. This 1% cap applies regardless of inflation, cost increases, or any other event that happened in the year that made expenses go up. And again, there's a maximum levy amount that can be assessed in relation to property values, so if values tank (like they did in the recession), even with your 1% increase, you're going to eventually run into a wall about how much you can raise versus the unchecked ability of your expenses to grow.
There is an exception to the 1% rule - if the voters approve, a taxing entity can suspend the 1% ceiling and assess their maximum allowable rate. Which has the benefit of continuing services and, perhaps more crucially, establishing a new floor from which the 1% increase cap next year will be calculated. This ballot measure is expensive to produce for those entities that have the capability to do so, and really can only be useful in times when property value increases have outpaced the 1% significantly enough that there's room in the rate to do the jump. Unsurprisingly, the ballot measure is generally only used when necessary, so as to not annoy the voters.
This year, it was necessary, or within a few years' time, The Organization's costs due to inflation and expenses would result in the closure of locations and layoffs of the people. The last time The Organization went out for this bid, the voters passed it. That was 12 years ago, and I can owe my career with The Organization to the fact that the voters passed it. The initial time period that The Organization promised to not go back to the voters for another was six years. So they've managed double their promised period from the last one, and they gave promises to the voters that they would increase hours, staffing, and materials available with the extra money. (This year's promise, just for being able to keep the lights on and keep going as we have been, is for making it last for five years before considering going back to the voters to ask again.)
There were no persons who wanted to form a committee to say no to The Organization's ask, so there was no statement against in the voter booklets.
And as of this post, while it looks like Aye has won out, the margin of difference between Aye and Nay is less than a half of a percentage point. And it could have been swayed one way or another if all the people who didn't actually register an opinion had done so.
This should not have been this close.
Just as a starting point, nobody wanted to be on the committee to say no. The Organization managed to get twelve years out of a six-year promise, keeping their promises to increase hours and staffing. They moved locations for better placement and even convinced a new town to annex in. And we managed to ride out the housing crash of 2008 and the lowered revenues from that with much less loss of career as could have happened. The money management skills of The Organization are really rather good. (Their people-management skills, on the other hand, still leave much to be desired, but that's a different seires of issues, some of which are already documented previously.) The amount of increase on the average home's property taxes in The Organization's service area would have been about $40 yearly.
And yet, the numbers of Aye and Nay are still far too close to each other than this situation would suggest. Yes, this particular area tends to be anti-tax in the way of Rand, for reasons that can probably be explained, if a bit head-scratchingly, by the fact that one of the regular users of my branch of the library regularly appears with a MAGA hat and a similarly pro-Administration T-shirt.
There are also a lot of people within The Organization's remit that are struggling to get by and make ends meet. If that increase yearly is the difference between being able to eat or obtain some other necessary service and funding the library, then I'm sorry about capitalism and the systematic gutting of the social safety net by people whose wealth could fund that net for eons to come, Grumpy Dragon. I get it. You're excused from what follows.
If not, though, and you're a person who could afford, and especially someone who could easily afford the increase yearly in your property taxes, then if you ever vote no on a funding increase of this sort from any library at all, this is what you should be required to do:
It's just generally galling how many people will not bat an eye about manipulations of taxes to make rich people richer, or try to take advantage of those manipulations themselves, and will then turn around and vote to starve public institutions of tax dollars that do such greater work with them than letting them sit in accounts accruing more money. Maybe if everyone had to account for these things in a more immediate manner, they might understand the functioning of their tax supports enough to make wise and informed decisions about how to apply those tax dollars.
The Organization went out for a ballot measure this year. Because an initiative passed by an anti-tax wealthy person passed in the 90s, public entites such as The Organization are restricted to only collecting 1% more in revenue from fiscal year to fiscal year, plus the bonus of any new construction taxes for that year, assuming that the taxing entity isn't collecting its maximum taxing authority. This 1% cap applies regardless of inflation, cost increases, or any other event that happened in the year that made expenses go up. And again, there's a maximum levy amount that can be assessed in relation to property values, so if values tank (like they did in the recession), even with your 1% increase, you're going to eventually run into a wall about how much you can raise versus the unchecked ability of your expenses to grow.
There is an exception to the 1% rule - if the voters approve, a taxing entity can suspend the 1% ceiling and assess their maximum allowable rate. Which has the benefit of continuing services and, perhaps more crucially, establishing a new floor from which the 1% increase cap next year will be calculated. This ballot measure is expensive to produce for those entities that have the capability to do so, and really can only be useful in times when property value increases have outpaced the 1% significantly enough that there's room in the rate to do the jump. Unsurprisingly, the ballot measure is generally only used when necessary, so as to not annoy the voters.
This year, it was necessary, or within a few years' time, The Organization's costs due to inflation and expenses would result in the closure of locations and layoffs of the people. The last time The Organization went out for this bid, the voters passed it. That was 12 years ago, and I can owe my career with The Organization to the fact that the voters passed it. The initial time period that The Organization promised to not go back to the voters for another was six years. So they've managed double their promised period from the last one, and they gave promises to the voters that they would increase hours, staffing, and materials available with the extra money. (This year's promise, just for being able to keep the lights on and keep going as we have been, is for making it last for five years before considering going back to the voters to ask again.)
There were no persons who wanted to form a committee to say no to The Organization's ask, so there was no statement against in the voter booklets.
And as of this post, while it looks like Aye has won out, the margin of difference between Aye and Nay is less than a half of a percentage point. And it could have been swayed one way or another if all the people who didn't actually register an opinion had done so.
This should not have been this close.
Just as a starting point, nobody wanted to be on the committee to say no. The Organization managed to get twelve years out of a six-year promise, keeping their promises to increase hours and staffing. They moved locations for better placement and even convinced a new town to annex in. And we managed to ride out the housing crash of 2008 and the lowered revenues from that with much less loss of career as could have happened. The money management skills of The Organization are really rather good. (Their people-management skills, on the other hand, still leave much to be desired, but that's a different seires of issues, some of which are already documented previously.) The amount of increase on the average home's property taxes in The Organization's service area would have been about $40 yearly.
And yet, the numbers of Aye and Nay are still far too close to each other than this situation would suggest. Yes, this particular area tends to be anti-tax in the way of Rand, for reasons that can probably be explained, if a bit head-scratchingly, by the fact that one of the regular users of my branch of the library regularly appears with a MAGA hat and a similarly pro-Administration T-shirt.
There are also a lot of people within The Organization's remit that are struggling to get by and make ends meet. If that increase yearly is the difference between being able to eat or obtain some other necessary service and funding the library, then I'm sorry about capitalism and the systematic gutting of the social safety net by people whose wealth could fund that net for eons to come, Grumpy Dragon. I get it. You're excused from what follows.
If not, though, and you're a person who could afford, and especially someone who could easily afford the increase yearly in your property taxes, then if you ever vote no on a funding increase of this sort from any library at all, this is what you should be required to do:
- Cease using library services, as much as possible or permissible. If you don't want to fund us, you don't get the benefits of using us. Attend no programs, check out no materials, whether print or electronic, use no database access, and otherwise cut yourself off from the library as much as possible. If you forget and attend, or you judge that something the library has or is putting on is that vital to yourself, then by all means, go and attend or check out/use the materials. Just remember to account for it on your accounting sheet, described below.
- If you have children, they're exempted from this prohibition. They don't have the voting power to say one way or another, and it would be cruel to cut them off for your decision. Similarly about relatives that you might want/have to take to the library for their own needs. However, any use of the library that your children or relatives do will have to be accounted for in your accounting sheet.
- Keep track of everything that you spend money on that you could have gotten (or did get) from the library.
- If there's a book, movie, CD, or other piece of media that you want, and you could have previewed it by checking out that piece before buying it, whatever cost you pay for it, including shipping and taxes, goes on your accounting sheet. If your children want media and you buy it for them when you could have gotten it at the library, note the cost of the media item, including shipping charges and taxes. If your children check media out from the library, note the cost of each of those pieces, including shipping and taxes, on your accounting sheet.
- If you use Internet access outside of your home that you pay for and that you could have used the library's free Internet access, whether wired or wireless, put the cost of that access on your accounting sheet.
- If you use services the library might have offered, including things as small as photocopies for personal use all the way through any consultation or education programs that the library offers in person or online (like live tutoring), note the cost you paid or that you would have paid, should you (wisely) decide to use a library subscription or program to get that service. Anything your children use also goes on your accounting sheet.
- Any database access the library offers to scholarly publications, automotive repair, genealogy, or anything else, if you use it, note the cost of each individual article or piece of information you get through library subscriptions and add that to your accounting sheet. For things like newspaper and magazine articles, use the cost of their annual subscription. Same thing goes for your children's access to those same resources.
- Keep track of the amount of time you spend searching for answers or recommendations using the Internet or reference works. If you make less than the average library worker, add the average library worker's salary to your accounting for the time that you spend on all of those questions. If you make more than the average library worker in your area, bill your own hourly rate for all of that time spent searching when you could have been doing something else. Add the time spent on these tasks for your kids, your relatives, and your friends as well. And if you (or your kids/relatives) use the excellent library staff to do some of these things, add their salary for the time it takes them to come back with answers or recommendations for you. Don't forget to add any database access or article costs that you come across.
- Feel free to make a note when you pass the point of what your annual increase would have been. Or, if you think I'm setting a low bar, what your library assessment for the year would have been with the increase. You don't get to stop accounting for everything when you reach that point, though, but you certainly can note how quickly you got to those points in the year. For those of you with children, it won't take long.
- This is not a single-year task. No, you have to keep accounting for every year that there isn't a library increase as a ballot issue. When there is one, consult your accounting sheets for every year that you've had to keep them, and recognize how much money you've spent (or could have spent) by not supporting your local public library with your tax assessment. If you want to stop keeping track of all those expenses, vote to support your local library. If you think it's fun and want to keep doing it, then I suppose you could vote no on supporting the library, because that's what you're signing up to do if you vote against - several more years of honestly keeping track of all the money you spent (or could have spent) that you could have avoided by supporting the library. It only stops when you realize how valuable your public library is and start supporting it properly. (If you have concerns about how the library is being run and spends its money, ask to be on the Board of Trustees (or equivalent governing board). Ask the auditors and maintainers of public finance for the publically-available financial documents and disclosures the library (or its attached municipal entity) has to make. Analyze to your heart's content, make suggestions if you see spaces for improvement.)
It's just generally galling how many people will not bat an eye about manipulations of taxes to make rich people richer, or try to take advantage of those manipulations themselves, and will then turn around and vote to starve public institutions of tax dollars that do such greater work with them than letting them sit in accounts accruing more money. Maybe if everyone had to account for these things in a more immediate manner, they might understand the functioning of their tax supports enough to make wise and informed decisions about how to apply those tax dollars.
no subject
Date: 2018-11-27 04:40 pm (UTC)I quite like your proposed remedy and would like to inflict it on some people I know.
I have library cards for two local libraries plus the state library (so I can read their ebooks on Libby; the local ones, I use in person as well.) This year, Smalltown Library is doing okay and didn't ask for a funding increase, which they have to do thanks to similar anti-tax rich-dude shenanigans fouling up the state budget a good long while ago.
ReallySmallTown Library did ask for a funding increase, and three weeks after the midterm, it is found to have failed by nine votes. NINE. I'm pretty steamed about this, and need to find out how I can donate them money. The pittance I can give them won't make up for the budget boost they needed, but maybe it's something? *sigh*
no subject
Date: 2018-11-27 08:38 pm (UTC)Ouch on ReallySmallLibrary. Donating might not be doable directly to the library, but they probably have a Foundation or Friends group that can take donations and then use that money to help the library out.
no subject
Date: 2018-11-28 04:09 pm (UTC)I'll see what I can swing this year, because I like ReallySmallLibrary and their programs, and I want to see them continue.
no subject
Date: 2018-11-27 09:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-11-27 11:00 pm (UTC)