Letter to | the Editor

To the Editor:
I am troubled that we have a referendum (today, Dec. 6) regarding spending $14,500,000. As I visit about this with my friends and those I know, so few folks are even aware of the referendum, much less some simple financial and emotional issues. In fact, over the last few weeks, no one I talked to was even aware of this vote. Please vote!
I choose, up front, to say that I have not been able to come to support this referendum.
First and foremost in mind is an IWCC statement that I disagree with: “Public and student safety is our top priority at Iowa Western.” This is in the same article/information submitted to the Atlantic News Telegraph, Omaha World Herald, Council Bluffs Daily Nonpareil and Shenandoah and Harlan radio stations. The top priority of our education systems needs to be “education.”
When I inquired of incidents at the Atlantic, Shenandoah, Harlan, Council Bluffs campuses – in the last seven or eight years, none were known in southwest Iowa. Yes, there were some disturbances in Council Bluffs – but not the sort that we have seen in the latest news programs we see and hear about these days, and not the sort that justifies the expense of being able to lock down these buildings.
Yes, someone can become disturbed about something and choose to target any school, church, downtown business or you walking down the street. They can do this at any time.
But, at what cost do we decide to lock the front doors, have guards at our churches and businesses, and challenge those approaching our front door? Will the cost significantly reduce the low percentage of our – even now – low risk level?
If we want to spend $14,500,000, bring me an education referendum. I will choose to support that.
Second, is financial. I am tired of the twists and turns of numbers presented to us by agencies dependent on our tax dollars. Few of us understand property taxes and the mill levy. Most people do not understand. Hence, I present a Google search definition that is pretty easy to understand: “The mill levy is the “tax rate” that is applied to the assessed (I will add: or “taxable”) value of a property. One mill is one dollar per $1,000 dollars of assessed value. It consists of a local portion which is used to fund area services and a statewide portion which is used to
fund public schools.”
IWCC says in its news release that it has a current bond (with a mill levy of .34) that will expire (as I am told) on June 30 of this year. That means that a portion of your tax bill should go down – next time around. If your home is assessed at $100,000, there is a ‘roll back’ on residences of about 45 percent of the assessed value to reach a taxable value of about $55,000. Here you go (55 thousand times $.34): Your tax is $18.70 on the current bond. If your commercial or business building follows the same scenario – assessed at $100,000, there is one change. The roll back is 10 percent. Hence the business owner is paying $.34 on 90 thousands (of taxable value), or a tax of $30.60. That tax will go away (according to IWCC) as the bond will be retired (paid?). You will have less tax to pay.
IWCC now says the new bond will come back with a new tax of $.13 per thousand dollars of taxable value. Here is your new tax (if applied to above examples): Residential: $7.15 and business owner: $11.70.
If you have read this far, thanks. I am not against IWCC or bond issues that will legitimately meet the goal of our children’s education. I find this to be an issue of common sense. I choose to not support this issue. But, please go vote on this Dec. 6. Did you even know there was a referendum?
Dale Gross, Atlantic