- Proposition 2 ½ allows for a split tax rate. Westfield has had a split rate for 33 years.
- Homeowners and tenants, through their landlords, pay 72.33 percent of our city’s tax bill of 65.38 million dollars.
- Agawam homeowners pay 60.2 percentof their tax bill, while West Springfield’s homeowners pay 53.9 percent of their tax bill. Both towns have a split rate.
- The tax shift factor in our city has been as high as 1.78 (2006). It now stands at 1.63. As it moves downward towards a single rate of 1.0 the tax burden on the homeowner increases as the shift slowly disappears.
- When the tax shift factor reached 1.78 a previous Chamber representative lobbied for a tax shift factor of 1.65- an increase of the homeowner’s tax burden.
- With the tax shift factor reduced to 1.63, the Chamber representative last November asked for a further reduction to 1.55—NOT the 1.59 claimed in the recent Letter To The Editor published online.
- If the 1.55 tax shift factor lobbied for by the Chamber had been adopted then the homeowner’s tax bill would have increased 4.5 percent not 2 percent.
- I voted against the 2 perceng increase after my motion for a 1.71 factor was not supported by a Council majority. My suggested tax factor would have levelled the homeowner’s tax bill.
- No Chamber representative has ever proposed a tax shift factor which would lighten the homeowner’s tax burden.
- A close examination of past lobbying efforts indicates that the Chamber supports a slow steady slide of the real estate tax burden onto the homeowner.
- Most of the tax break dollars lobbied for by the Chamber and their Attorney would go to international companies( General Dynamics, Home Depot, Stop and Shop, Mc Donald’s etc.),and international banks and international oil companies (Bank of America, Santander, TD Bank, Sunoco and Exxon).
- I have supported the establishment of a 3rd class for small Westfield owned businesses. Special state legislation will be necessary to accomplish that goal. Percentagewise these businesses shoulder a very small share of the overall tax burden. I am a private sector person from a family of small business owners so I empathize with the small business owner.
- Most of our largest commercial-industrial taxpayers came to Westfield AFTER the split rate system was established in 1982.We were viewed as business friendly 33 years ago—we still are—that’s why we have been featured in the Boston Globe. Government provides business with an airport, Mass Turnpike, Interstate 91, fire and police protection, a low crime rate, great schools which provide an educated workforce and a Municipal Gas and Electric which provides multiple services. We are business friendly right now.
This past year we have seen 3 new restaurants-one downtown- a medical building on E.Main St. and a new office building on Southampton Rd.—just some of the new business growth.
- I have been, am at present, and will be in the future, on the side of homeowners and tenants regarding the tax shift factor issue.
I see no reason to support a 14.7 percent increase homeowner tax increase-on top of the normal 2 ½ percent increase- whether it happens all at once- or, as advocated by the Chamber—bit by bit. An elimination of the split rate would increase the homeowners’ share of the tax burden from 72.33 percent to 83.06 percent.
Cindy Harris
Councilor At Large
