Harford Property Tax Revolt

 
About five years ago, Harford County government called on the members of the Harford County State Delegation in Annapolis to give them the right to impose a new tax. This tax would only affect the big, bad developers that are bringing new people into the county from other places and crowding our schools–so they said.

This new tax was the Home Buyer’s Tax that requires every developer in Harford County to be charged ~$8,000 per house to be paid when acquiring a permit – up front, before any money has been made.

The idea of the tax seems noble enough- the money raised from the tax goes into the Harford County Public Schools Capital Budget account so that it must be used only for new school development, property acquisition, or school renovation. But a tax that exists to take advantage of a specific group of people (in this case, consumers and builders) is unfair, and should be eliminated. The Home Buyer’s Tax does not hurt or punish big bad developers, the tax is passed on to new homeowners in Harford County, many of which are already Harford County residents purchasing a new home in another neighborhood. This means that these residents are being unfairly double-taxed.

The revenue raised from this tax was approximately $2.2M dollars last year. The last school that was completed in Harford County was the new Bel Air High School. As of the January status report found here the high school cost a total of ~$57 Million to date. Clearly, the Home Buyer’s Tax does not generate enough revenue to substantially cover our school costs given the fact that it doesn’t even cover 3% of the cost for one school. The Home Buyer’s Tax is simply unnecessary and fundamentally a mismanagement of taxpayer money. Furthermore, I am sure that we could find $2.2 million dollars of spending in the county budget that we could cut to send this money back to the taxpayers–thereby eliminating the Home Buyer’s Tax.

The damage that this Home Buyer’s Tax does to the thousands of Harford Countians who want to buy homes in the county is far greater than the benefit provided to the HCPS Capital Budget. Without this tax, we will still build new schools, and we will still borrow money through bonds to break up the payments over time. The Home Buyer’s Tax was imposed only four years ago, how did we pay for schools before that?

Here in Harford County, we pay property taxes at the County and municipal level. On a home that is assessed at $250,000, the annual County portion of taxes amount to $2,705. This tax amount is the property owner’s share of the County Government, including school construction. They move here and are willing to pay this amount, growing at 5% per year. Why should we burden them with an additional tax assigned to them before they get here?

I fully support making people pay for costs that they incur. For example, if a new home being built on a farm requires water, sewer, and road construction, there should be a tax levied on the owner to pay for it. But this tax is simply an arbitrary one-size-fits-all approach to generating infrastructure revenue.

Please join me in calling for the Harford County Council to pass Bill 09-29 to repeal the Home Buyer’s Tax. The tax is as unfair today as it was four years ago and repealing the tax will create jobs for Harford County.
 


Comments

Zach

Wed, 30 Dec 2009 12:17:25

Your description of this as a home buyers tax is incorrect and misleading. The tax is a home builders tax, it is intended to help the county cope with the infux of new constuction. In order to avoid the tax all you have to do is buy a "used" home in the county. This is not unreasonable, it cost the residents a lot of money for others to move here and add to the population. They use up the services that were paid for by the current residents and it takes way too long for them to pay that money back. If they replace a current resident by purchasing their house then they have the right to take on the services that they existing resident paid to put in place.

 



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    About Patrick McGrady

    I'm fed up with the way Government at all levels has usurped the individual liberties of the people. 


    It starts with you and me. Let's take them back!

Fair taxes for Harford County!