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Letters: Without impact fees, taxpayers fund business development

 
Published Nov. 20, 2014

Taxpayers fund business projects

County Administrator Len Sossamon's comment about a lack of money for giving tax dollars to businesses as financial incentives is exactly one reason people are fed up with tax proposals like the Penny for Projects.

If a successful business wants to locate in Hernando, it should not need handouts of taxpayer money to seal the deal. This practice is putting business development on taxpayers' shoulders and is becoming all too common. Time and again we have seen county commissioners cave in on impact fees. It is always tax increases instead of tax decreases.

Stop the generous decreases in property taxes for all the fraudulent sinkhole claims in Hernando, and the county commissioners will have plenty of money to play with. It must be so much fun to spend other people's money.

James Payne, Spring Hill

Use impact fees to fund growth needs

Seems to me that the Hernando County administrator and the commissioners are simply in a state of denial as to why the voters said no to the Penny for Projects referendum.

According to all the comments I've read in the newspaper, they simply cannot fathom why we don't want to pay extra for improvements to our infrastructure and make other improvements that are vitally needed. Somehow they have deluded themselves into thinking that we are all just selfish and are not thinking clearly.

Maybe they just need to hear the simple answer: It was your failure to assess impact fees! And if you think the vote wasn't too bad, let me give you some more information. If the School Board had not joined the initiative, the defeat would have been much, much worse. Everyone I talked to that voted for the tax indicated that they did so to help the children, not for the commission.

So, if you want citizens to pass additional taxes on ourselves, start doing the right thing by assessing the people who are responsible for most of the needed improvements — new residents. And don't try to skimp or do it on the cheap. Assess the amounts the consultants indicated were defensible and proper.

For the School Board folks, you have a lot of support with most of us. We're willing to pay additional taxes to help educate our children and grandchildren. However, as with needed roads, water, sewage, etc., the need for additional schools is created by new people moving in, not by the folks that are already here. That makes impact fees for schools even more necessary.

How about we put an initiative to the voters that asks us to vote for or against the full and complete assessment of impact fees? Think it would pass?

Ken Trufant, Spring Hill

Sales tax vote sends message

I just got finished reading Dan DeWitt's column in the Hernando Times about the county turning down the Penny for Projects sales tax increase. My wife and I both voted against the tax increase, not because we wanted to, but we wanted to send a message to Hernando County commissioners to reinstate the impact fees for new construction.

Why, you ask? We live in a local retirement community where we pay school and property taxes and get nothing for it. (Actually "taxation without representation!") Our community has no children in the schools, nor will we ever have any children in the schools. We maintain all our own roads, grounds and facilities through our monthly association fees. These communities like ours are just a cash cow for Hernando County. They don't supply us with any of the services other taxpayers receive.

To watch the new construction all around the county, strip mall after strip mall with Hobby Lobby, Walmart, Olive Garden, hospitals and on and on and on, and no impact fees . . . . Stop trying to kid us. These businesses can afford to pay impact fees. This is nothing but a rip-off for us, and we are tired of the county commissioners who are in bed with the builders and construction firms.

It's time for a push-back, and this is the first salvo. Show us that you mean business by reinstating the county impact fees, and we will show you we care and will look at increasing the county sales tax.

Dennis Fischer, Spring Hill

Use impact fees before tax hikes

I wholeheartedly agree with JoAnne Flynn's letter of Nov. 14, as I was going to write with the exact same message.

I, also, will vote no until impact fees are reinstated on builders. As a mother of a music professor, I am well aware of how important the arts and education are in schools. We paid those fees every time we bought a new home in Illinois, and it certainly didn't deter sales.

Ruth Stillo, Weeki Wachee

Democrats need strong leadership

There are about 450,000 more registered Democrats than Republicans in Florida, yet Republicans dominate the elective offices. This can only be because the Democratic Party "leadership" in Florida is failing to do its job. One may try to argue that the Republican dominance is because of gerrymandering, but that's not true. Offices not affected by political district boundaries are also dominated by Republicans.

Too many elections are not being challenged by Democrats, forfeiting those positions to the Republicans. True leaders would be out, all over the state, recruiting quality candidates for all positions at all levels. Not just sitting around trying to play kingmaker for high-profile offices. It takes a lot of work to do that, and current "leadership" has proven itself incapable (or unwilling) to put forth that effort.

It is well past time to throw out the incompetent and malfeasant deadwood and move in new blood that wants to win and will do the work necessary to accomplish that goal.

Wayne McVay, Spring Hill

Tough to beat party loyalty

A special expression of gratitude to the 4,426 Hernando County citizens who voted for my independent candidacy for county commissioner this past election, Nov. 4.

I was appreciative of your endorsement.

Also, a thank-you to those 35,000-plus Hernando County voters who opposed the collaborative penny sales tax referendum, between the county and the Hernando County School District.

While I lost my race for commissioner, opposing the 1 percent sales tax as a candidate, alone, was gratifying. Too bad the same voters could not have been so forthcoming in my commission race.

Party loyalty is so difficult to overcome, as a third-party candidate.

Brian P. Moore, Spring Hill