Can you afford to pay a quarter cent more for taxes? Commercials featuring AB Tech President Hank Dunn assure the folks that tourists will pick up the brunt of the tax. This is one instant where economic multipliers are not being applied out the yin-yang. Instead, we are to assume no one will be marginalized into foregoing purchases, etc.
The tax is billed by proponents as a revenue generator for new buildings on the AB Tech campuses. The buildings are then to translate directly to jobs and education.
Citizens who think they are taxed enough already fear the funds will not be used responsibly. They want AB Tech to open its books and show there is a need for capital improvements. Are rooms operated at capacity, or could adjustments in scheduling handle student population increases?
How much expansion could the college fund out of its own budget? Rumor has it available resources continue to be squandered on year-end sprees to justify budgets, purchasing items at ten-fold markups from state-approved vendors, and the rather new seventeen-fold increase in administrative staffing including a personal chef.
Now, a personal chef is a job, and by today’s standards, anything that creates a job is good. Yet some wonder if the jobs the tax is supposed to create will go to Americans. There are allegations the college has been contracting with employers of undocumented workers.
Supposedly somebody filed a Freedom of Information Act request for this kind of stuff. Rules require a nod from Raleigh before the college can divulge information, and the turnaround time just happens delay the information from getting back before the election.
Although it shouldn’t be likely, one of the most-repeated concerns is that the funds will go to the county’s general fund with no binding commitment for future boards to support the proposed appropriation. After all, the Buncombe County Commissioners recently betrayed the voters’ trust by implementing zoning after it was overturned by a wide margin in a referendum.
One of the best questions is why AB Tech lovers would want to give government a rake when they can always donate directly to the college. (Yeah, yeah. Taxes are a way of expecting others to carry more of the burden.)
For you un-early voters, here’s the lowdown from the pro-tax and the pro-taxpayer perspectives.
