Talking Taxes

Dear Hecate
We are homeowners in a "wealthy suburb" of Western Mass where I work as a school teacher and my husband is a firefighter. We send our kids to the public schools, and we both participate in all the various fundraising activites that support our children's sports and "extra curricular" activities. It's a great school system and our kids are doing very well. We've worked for a 21/2 over ride and willingly paid more property taxes to support our town's current level of public services, including by the way a couple of programs for elderly residents, and a whole new water system. We're worried that eventually we'll be priced out of the town we both work in or we'll lose our jobs to budget cuts. Or both. We know that Governor Patrick is talking about finding ways to reduce local property taxes and support public services at the same time. Any hope?

Hecate says


There's always hope, but hope is not a course of action.

Increasingly, working families in towns and cities all over the state are bumping into the same "problem".........a healthy community includes good schools and safe neighborhoods, a range of public health programs and it all costs money. As Congressman Barney Frank says, you can buy lots of stuff with the money in your pocket, but we all have to pool our money to pay for things we can't do for ourselves. Like schools for the community's children, adequate salaries for trained firefighters and police officers, clean water, accessable roads etc etc.

Pooling your money with other residents in your community is called taxes. And you folks up in Massachusetts are beginning to use the word in a conjunction with the your government's services and structures that your taxes pay for.

Good for the Governor for using the word.

Good for local residents like you who have already made an informed 2 1/2 over ride decision to pay more taxes to keep the services that keep your community healthy.

That's the kind of actions that gives me hope.