Letter: Questions to be answered before new ESPLOST

Published 7:28 am Tuesday, August 2, 2011

If, by chance, all the local SPLOSTs are passed by the voters that will put our sales tax at 8 cents on the dollar. In addition, we still have to pay property tax and state income tax.

Tennessee’s sales tax is just over 9 cents and the property tax in Hamilton County and its cities are comparable with Whitfield County and its cities. But they don’t have a state income tax.

So why would anyone want to move into this area to start a new manufacturing plant or open a new business?

The ESPLOST that the county and city school boards want to extend are part of this. The new county schools on Crow Road and Cedar Ridge Road were built for show, not improvement of services. Why do they have to be so elaborate? Could we not get the same or better benefit out of something without all the frills? There are a lot of wasted tax dollars that could be eliminated if they would just spend tax dollars like you should spend your own.

Further, there needs to be a lot of changes made in the operation of our school systems.

A student today does not graduate with the same skills as they did in the early ‘60s. A lot of things have changed, but not the necessary skills to prepare you for life. Everyone in school is not a candidate for higher education in college so we also need to teach the crafts and the trades.

Technology has come a long way and is taking jobs away from the trades and crafts, but there will always be a need for someone to know how to repair something out in the field, wherever that may be.

Our school systems also need to change the way the school tax is calculated. A house with the same value regardless of how many students or soon to be students live there has the same tax rate. This is not fair to all taxpayers. It should be calculated so that those who use the service the most pay their fair share of the expense. The out-of-area students should pay no less than the average cost for regular students.

Before I will vote for an extension of the ESPLOST, what I’ve mentioned above will have to be addressed and their reason as stated in the paper will have to be better reasoned.

Larry E. Underwood

Dalton