Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Send a Message to the City

Want to send a strong message to the city that you don't approve how the city is spending your money?  Here's how you can.

A city resident, who only wanted to be identified as J.T., informed me that he too was concerned about how the city is picking fights and starting lawsuits with no regard to the welfare of the people.  He felt the city has enough debt already.  Although his mortgage company is regularly scheduled to make the payment of his property taxes early in November to qualify for the small discount, he did not want to do that this year.  He contacted his mortgage company over the phone and informed his mortgage company that he would prefer to delay the payment of his property taxes until March or April.  The mortgage company said that this would not be a problem.  They only required that once he received his final tax bill that he send a written request to do this.

You too can contact your mortgage company and do the same.  Keep in mind, that by paying your property taxes in March or April, instead of November or December, you will not qualify for the small discount that is given by paying your taxes early.  By paying your taxes in March or April, your taxes will not be late, you will only not qualify for the early discount.

With the way the city has recently cleaned out the funds to pay the county the overdue payments of $348,779.34 for the Mt. Olive Utility System, the city's operating funds are low at best.  As verified in the 2009 Fiscal Year Audit, the city still owes the county $531,000 in back Impact Fees collected from Developers from 2007 & 2008 which were never forwarded to the county.  The next payment in excess of $174,000 due to the county for the Mt. Olive Utility system is due in February. The city is operating on borrowed time already.  If the city does not get the Ad Valorem taxes as early as they planned, it will only speed up the inevitable.  The Governor's office will declare Polk City in a Financial State of Emergency.  The city will be required to provide a solid plan to get out of it's operating deficit and show that the city has a viable plan for the future, or else.  This is long overdue.

2 comments:

  1. I am glad to see that some people can pay their taxes on time at all. Don't have to worry about mine. I am still working on 2009 taxes. My taxes tripled since 2001 but property values have gone way down. Dave Woodman

    ReplyDelete
  2. I did this already, right after the meeting when they deceided to rape all the city accounts to pay the 2 late payments on the Mt Olive plant. I will not give them any more money until it is due. They are out of control. I pray the state will step in soon.
    Fed Up.

    ReplyDelete