Yesterday’s Standard-Examiner editorialized in favor of disclosing all records (sale prices) for real estate transactions in Utah. Utah is currently one of only eight states in the nation that are non-disclosure states. The S-E’s reasoning that county assessors can more fairly determine market values for all properties if disclosure is the law is right on.
Under Utah’s current system high end properties aren’t fairly assessed (they’re often extremely low) because most property sales that could be used for comparison purposes in appraising these parcels aren’t sold through the Multiple Listing Service (MLS) maintained by Utah’s Realtors. This database is currently the only available source for real estate sales data. Until our legislature ends non-disclosure and breaks the Board of Realtor’s stranglehold on nearly all real estate market data, middle class and poor Utahns will continue to take on a substantial share of the tax burden that rightfully belongs to some of Utah’s wealthiest residents.
Thank you Standard-Examiner. Non-disclosure in Utah isn’t yet truly threatened but your voice definitely helps.
Full Disclosure: I am currently employed by the Davis County Assessor as a Certified Residential Appraiser. This blog post represents my own opinion only.
Today’s Deseret Morning News editorial rightly cautions lawmakers considering property tax policy revisions in the upcoming legislative session. Many of the changes proposed by various lawmakers could cause far more harm than good. Any attempt to assess residential parcels using a measurement other than current fair market value will create inequities as bad or worse than those we have seen this past year. Too many of the proposed changes would alter this method of assessment and would result in an unfair distribution of the tax burden in most of Utah’s counties (the potential inequities favor wealthy property owners over average home owners in nearly every case).
There are obvious problems with the current system that need to be fixed. One example of a very positive change that should be considered is the proposal to require counties to assess all parcels every year instead of only assessing each city within the county every five years. Many of the property tax inequities which occurred in Davis County this year wouldn’t have happened under this policy.*
My only disagreement with the Deseret Morning News stems from their opposition to Sen. Neiderhauser’s proposal requiring voter approval of any tax increases above and beyond levels of inflation. As a resident of Davis County where we’ve been hit with several foolish tax increases over the past few years I think this proposal deserves some discussion. This policy would put more power in the hands of voters instead of the politicians who sometimes seem to pay more attention to narrow partisan interests than they do to the needs of county residents.
*It should be noted that Davis County is making every effort to implement this policy even if the state doesn’t require them to do it. James Ivey, the Davis County Assessor (and my boss), has asked for and received additional funding from the Davis County Commission to pay for the personnel needed to complete this huge task for tax year 2008.
My favorite 4th amendment activist group has a post on their blog about the recent taser incident which occurred here in Utah. Give it a read. Everyone should know the correct way to deal with police encounters.
Here’s Judge Andrew Napolitano on the unconstitutionality of the Patriot Act:
The Patriot Act’s two most principle constitutional errors are an assault on the Fourth Amendment, and on the First…
…So FBI agents can write their own search warrant [under the name “national security letters”] with just the permission of their superior, no judge at all, nobody at the main Department of Justice, and serve it essentially on any entity they want, and if they serve this search warrant on your doctor, lawyer, grocer, or mailman, and that doctor, lawyer, grocer, or mailman tells you they received it, then that doctor, lawyer, grocer, or mailman, can be prosecuted for a felony, face five years in jail. What part of the First Amendment’s “Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech” do they not understand?
This creates a Soviet-style conundrum for the recipient, who can’t even tell his or her lawyer or general counsel about getting the search warrant. You can’t hire outside counsel to challenge it, you can’t mention it to your spouse on the pillow, to your priest in confession—not even to a federal judge in a federal courtroom where all language except perjury should be permitted. This is a conundrum the likes of which government has never visited even under the Alien and Sedition Act. If they prosecuted you for criticizing [President John] Adams you could complain about it to your heart’s content without being charged with another crime.
These are issues our nation’s founders started a war over. Obviously contemporary Americans think a lot less of their own civil liberties than their forebears.
Read the whole article.
Bishop Higgins is running the 3rd Ward with incredible efficiency.
If you aren’t sick or ailing, after you hear this, you just might wish you had gout or lupus or something. Sister Culbert has made a number of her award winning spicy radish casseroles that we, as a bishopric, will be passing out to the sick and the ailing. What we’ll do first, is to give the casserole a blessing. That way, you’ll be getting a hot meal and a blessing at the same time. It was my idea.
That man truly is inspired.
Today KSL posted a story on their website about a recent study (I can only assume it was commissioned by our legislature) showing that our lawmakers need a raise. Here is the first comment by a reader named “boojum” on that story:
Let’s set up a voucher program to help people move out of Utah. Fewer citizens per district will mean less people for each representative to represent! Think outside the box! Don’t just cave to the powerful legislator union and raise taxes to prop up our failing congress!
Maybe our legislature really is under-paid…I don’t know. Either way that comment is still damn funny.
Its been a while since I could say that I completely agree with the Republicans but…
Amen and amen.
I stopped actively participating in the voucher debate quite a while before the election. I just hated the idea of arguing for the status quo when it clearly isn’t that much better than the flawed laws our legislators gave us in the forms of HB148 and HB172.
Truth be told I really don’t have a great answer for what needs to be done to improve our education system if vouchers aren’t the answer. Utah has a history of providing a public education that is better than what is provided in most other states but is that good enough? I mentioned earlier that I don’t like being associated with UEA because I agree with many on the right that the union doesn’t put my kids’ best interests ahead of its own agenda. We need new solutions like merit pay for teachers, year-round school, more charter schools, and greater flexibility for parents in regards who which public schools they can send their kids to. The huge herd of kids headed for Utah’s schools over the next decade won’t be well served by refusal of the education establishment to budge from the status quo.
It is Wednesday now. The election is over and the voucher plan is dead. We’ve worked so hard fighting (righteously I think) against one proposed solution to our system’s problems. What solutions do we have to offer for the problems that our state faces in educating our kids over the next couple decades? I don’t know but I think it is important that the conversation continue and that we consider real changes from business as usual.
UPDATE: 11/07/2007 8:51 AM
My biggest fear, post election, is that people will treat this vote as a mandate for the status quo. That would be a tragic defeat for children.
–Randy Smith of DavisParents.org
AMEN to that!
This post by Derek at ‘A Liberal Mormon’ is the best post I’ve read in Utah’s bloghive this year.
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