Good Night!

Wow. If you want to give someone a civics lesson about every vote counting, you can direct them to this city council race.

Today, after all the early and provisional ballots were counted, I did advance as one of the "Sidney Six", by the slimmest possible of margins, one single vote.

I am humbled and honored to still be a candidate for our city council.

I will end this post as I did the last: Stay tuned!

Thank you and...good night?

First, I want to thank all of you who supported my bid for council. I really appreciate the votes! Also, much thanks to those who let me put up signs, I'll be around soon to collect them.

I just spoke to the clerk's office, and have been told that any early and absentee votes cast on Friday and Monday have not been counted yet, so the final counts will change. Currently, Zane Hall has 16 votes more than I do to advance as one of the Sidney Six. The canvassing board will be counting the 250-plus ballots Thursday afternoon, starting at 2 p.m.

While I am not holding my breath, I am optimistic about the circumstances.

Stay tuned!

The final countdown

Only a few more days until the primary election is complete. Only a few more days to decide which six candidates for the city council will be on the ballot in November.
I hope that I will be one of the “Sidney Six,” and ultimately, hope to show you my knowledge of the issues is worth your vote in November.
After the primary I will be dropping my link to KSID’s Web site, at least for a while.
(If I do advance to the November ballot, I will link this site again when the election is closer.)
In the meantime, please bookmark the page and share the address with anyone who is interested.
If I do not advance in the election, I will continue to be an interested observer and will continue writing about local issues.

Let's talk taxes

Thank you again to KSID and the Sun-Telegraph for sponsoring the candidate forum Monday evening.
It was great to have an opportunity to meet with the other candidates and talk about some of the issues facing our community.

One issue we didn’t really have a chance to discuss was property taxes, and I want to say a bit about it now.
If you own a home in Sidney with a tax valuation of $100,000, you pay about $2,300 in property taxes.
How much of that goes to the city? About $420.
That’s right, $420. A little more than half or about $1,200 goes to the school district and the rest goes to the county (about $500), WNCC, NRD, ESU, airport and the historical society.
Yes.
Your $420 is what pays for the police department, fire department equipment and training, the library, the swimming pool, the parks, the golf course, the streets, the snow removal and countless other city services.
I repeat, $420.
And yes, a few departments collect some sort of fees to help offset the expenses such as the golf course and swimming pool, but these services are available only because they are subsidized by your tax dollars.

Well, that’s not quite the whole story of course, because the city also collects sales tax to pay for these services.
There is a one-cent sales tax that was approved by the voters in 1980 that amounts to about $1.3 million. The voters also passed an additional half-cent tax in 1988 to fund community and economic development. (Details are in an earlier post regarding economic development money)

The city collects almost twice as much in sales tax per year as it does in property tax.

So, the city is much more dependent upon the sales tax than the property tax. But, the state created a program to attract businesses and create jobs, and when businesses prove they have qualified, they can ask for the sales taxes they’ve paid to be returned.
So, the city has been refunding lots of the sales tax.
That’s what all the uproar is about.
If you want your property taxes to remain at $420 (or less) and still have street repairs, a police department, fire department equipment and training, the library, the swimming pool, the parks, the golf course, the streets, the snow removal and countless other city services, then we need to be able to spend the sales tax dollars on these services.