Kootenai County Hears Tax Tips Backing Appropriate Bills Urged By State Senator
If Kootenai County wants to cut its property taxes, it should support bills that allow cities and counties to consolidate services, according to Sen. Jerry Thorne, R-Nampa.
The county’s leaders also should support legislation that empowers them to levy local option taxes, says Thorne, chairman of the Senate Local Government & Taxation committee.
Thorne sees all the tax ideas that survive the frugal House and its taxation committee. He was in town Monday night to hear proposals from Coeur d’Alene Area Chamber of Commerce leaders and local officials for cutting property taxes.
County Clerk Tom Taggart drew the loudest applause from about 50 locals when he outlined the need to reform the antiquated state sales tax distribution formula.
Boom economies like Kootenai County’s end up supporting rural Idaho counties because of the complicated formula, he said.
“Without that formula, I believe Kootenai County would have had much of the money needed to provide our services,” he said.
Thorne could not guarantee much in the way of change for North Idaho’s tax woes.
An opponent of impact fees, Thorne said that support for such fees still exists around the statehouse. “Growth should finance growth, but I don’t think impact fees are the answer to the problem of growth.”
North Idaho leaders say they get slighted in the Legislature, compared to Boise and southern Idaho, where most of the state’s population and commerce lies. Only Boise’s Ada County, for example, can assess impact fees under state law.
While North Idaho’s legislative delegation this year contains far more members of the Republican party that now runs things in Boise, getting tax reform that benefits the Panhandle has been a struggle.
“The ‘State of Boise’ doesn’t have to get all the consideration all the time,” Thorne said. “Don’t give up on us.”
Other ideas presented to Thorne included privatization of government services, lowering real estate transfer fees, delaying the homeowners exemption for new residents and considering other taxes to replace the high property taxes.
Lori Barnes, new executive director of the North Idaho Building Contractors Association, emphasized that Monday’s meeting was designed to think of ways to broaden the tax base, not to increase it.
Property tax reduction activist Ron Rankin said he was concerned that new tax proposals would not ensure that existing property taxes drop as other taxes rise.
But Rankin agreed that the likelihood of any new tax measure getting through the conservative legislature during the next legislative session would be unlikely.
, DataTimes