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cwolff 
Group: Members
Posts: 265
Joined: Aug. 2003
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Posted on: Feb. 24 2004,11:43 am |
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An article appeared today in the Star Tribune regarding a proposed LGA bill in the House.
Sen. Tom Bakk, DFL-Cook unveiled a proposed bill to restore $60 million to the hardest hit cities, or about 40 percent of the $150 million in reductions. Mr. Bakk's bill will be cosponsored in the House by Republican Rep. Dan Dorman.
The statistics showed that the per-capita LGA cuts for Minneapolis and St. Paul amounted to about $82, and about $42 for outstate cities, but only about $17 per capita for affluent surburban cities.
The proposed LGA bill would like the formula that sets the LGA amounts to be changed to give less to the more affluent surburban cities. The more affluent cities already have the highest valued properties in the state.
Rep. Dorman, my question to you is this, do you want the affluent surburban cities, who already pay the highest property taxes in the state, to have their LGA payments cut even more, so that their property taxes will have to be raised even higher than they were this past year to make up the difference?
I know of outstate residents/friends that have larger homes and larger properties, but pay not even one fourth of what I pay in property taxes living in Burnsville.
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| Post Number: 2
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minnow
Group: Members
Posts: 2243
Joined: Aug. 2003
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Posted on: Feb. 24 2004,4:27 pm |
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It's a little like this here...You gots to give up a few bones to placate da inner city thugs so they don't migrate out yer way.
Call it insurance if that makes ya feel better...LOL 
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MrTarzan
Group: Members
Posts: 564
Joined: Feb. 2004
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Posted on: Feb. 24 2004,6:16 pm |
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Why do we have LGA? Why take money from communities so that it can be spent by the state in the form of refunds to communities? Leave it in the community in the first place and get rid of the middle man. Otherwise it is plainly redistribution of wealth, not taxation for necessary governmental services. 
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Be not simply good, be good for something-Henry David Thoreau
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| Post Number: 4
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cpu_slave
Group: Members
Posts: 297
Joined: Aug. 2003
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Posted on: Feb. 26 2004,9:48 am |
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Tarzan, we have LGA simply because smaller towns (like Albert Lea) don't pull in enough tax money on their own to pay for the basic services provided. If you want to see LGA go away, then prepare for the double-digit spike in tax increases to pay for all the things the local government does. Do you honestly think that a cut or an elimination of LGA is going to mean that local government is actually going to get smaller? Someone has to pay for that port authority and economic development program...
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An age is called Dark, not because the light fails to shine, but because people refuse to see it.-James A. Michener
Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe.-Albert Einstein
Wise men learn more from fools than fools from wise men.- Marcus Cato
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Madd Max
Group: Members
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Joined: Aug. 2003
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Posted on: Feb. 26 2004,12:17 pm |
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| Quote (cwolff @ Feb. 24 2004,11:43:am) | | Rep. Dorman, my question to you is this, do you want the affluent surburban cities, who already pay the highest property taxes in the state, to have their LGA payments cut even more, |
cwolff
Last session I thought that the metro area was upset because cities outside of the metro area were getting LGA but city in the metro were not. thus they cut LGA payment to cities outside of the metro area I believe (not sure ) but I think Albert Lea had 1 1/2 Million cut from its LGA SO can someone tell me what is really going on.
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Heck, if crazy were a pre-existing condition, the GOP wouldn't be able to get insurance. James Carville
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| Post Number: 6
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cwolff
Group: Members
Posts: 265
Joined: Aug. 2003
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Posted on: Feb. 26 2004,5:07 pm |
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CPU_Slave, wouldn't you rather have your taxes raised to pay for basic governmental functions in your city or would you rather have my taxes raised in Burnsville so that you can again receive the same amount of LGA or more?
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| Post Number: 7
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iowegian
Group: Members
Posts: 27
Joined: Feb. 2004
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Posted on: Feb. 26 2004,5:53 pm |
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Not that Iowa always has more common sense, but...
Isn't LGA sort of a welfare for cities that spent more than their tax base could support?
Weren't the citizens of those cities in the dark when city councils spent way more than they could afford because everthing looked fine in the budget with millions of LGA added?
Now won't the citizens see the councils were spending like drunken sailors (all that LGA) and will hopefully scrutinize their city council's budget ?
That's how it is supposed to work.
LGA caused an abnormality in economics. Without it the voters would have seen the city staff and council were not doing their jobs of being business friendly, building tax base, and being frugal with their budgets.
LGA caused staff to think they knew it all and could do it all with all this money coming in, and they then squandered, wasted, and bloated their budget thinking the day of being responsible would never come.
Let the residents see their elected officials balance a budget without LGA.
Let the bill for more welfare for cities that don't know what they are doing die on the house floor.
Enough losing jobs, and chasing ghosts with promises of buying and selling buildings for a dollar--(leave that to private enterprise).
If the city councils and staff can't run the city, it's time to find people who can.
I'm glad my house is in Northwood. Love seein' those MN license plates in town. Y'all come back now, ya hear?
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| Post Number: 8
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cwolff
Group: Members
Posts: 265
Joined: Aug. 2003
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Posted on: Feb. 26 2004,8:18 pm |
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Iowegian, I got one word to say to that, AMEN! Nicely done!
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| Post Number: 9
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MrTarzan
Group: Members
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Joined: Feb. 2004
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Posted on: Feb. 26 2004,9:51 pm |
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I could'nt have put it better Iowegian. Hey by the way is our economic development leaders family business doing well now that they put it in Iowa too? 
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Be not simply good, be good for something-Henry David Thoreau
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| Post Number: 10
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repdan
justdan
Group: Members
Posts: 649
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Posted on: Feb. 26 2004,11:01 pm |
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cwolf.....and others..
Property tax is based on value not size of shape or income. On average, the wealthy suburbs pay a rate that is 10% less than we do.
Short course on LGA
LGA is a property tax relief program that when funded, attempts to even out property tax rates on basic services. The key word is basic services. The extras that a community may want or waste is not considered. So you have need less ability to pay equals the amount of LGA. For example, City A and B have the same need but A has less value (ability to pay). What the formula would do is send LGA to city A to bring down it's city portion of the taxes to the same rate as city B. Now if both cities want to have extras, let's say downtown flowers, the rate required in city A would be greater than that in city B. So in the example, the two city budgets are the same tax payers would pay the same rate for basic services and the tax payers in the property tax poor city would pay a higher rate on the extras. A city is not rewarded for higher spending. That went out in the 80's but the myth is still out there.
I don't know where in the metro you live, but I would be shocked if you live in an outer suburb and you taxes (city portion) went up anywhere near what they did here.
The question that we have to ask ourselves is what do we want our state to look like. I don't choose to live in South Dakota for example.
There are many places that recieve no LGA because they don't have need. However, these cities do recieve transit levy relief. If you go back to the 2001 bill, many suburbs got more transit relief than we got in total relief.
The cities in Greater MN cut their budgets by almost 5% from last year, how did your city do? The ave for the burbs was only 1.8%
Going back to the 2001 bill , the idea was to get that same % of relief in all parts of the state. That ment that in the property tax wealthy areas, they got more $$$ per person but the % of relief was the same. It seems to me, that if we can no longer afford the 2001 tax bill that the % of the cut should be the same.
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carpe ductem.....remember we're all in this together..I'm pull'n for you.
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