New Schaumburg tax doesn't add up

I sat through Ken Fritz's presentation trying to justify the new real estate tax and the numbers he used did not add up.

It would be nice for him to post his presentation online so others could see it and check his math. On one slide he said they had a $8 million deficit ... then later it became $17 million.

When he made the request (or as his title of his slide said, "The Benefits of a RE Tax") the number became $23.7 million. Then he rolled out the "for the average house valued at $250K this would be $252 and a wash with the garbage pickup and car license fee." Well, $23.7 million divided by $252 equals 94,047 houses. Last time I checked, Schaumburg had a population of 75,000.

The really sad part, was they tried to sell this RE Tax because of the bad economy and blame their rising costs of pensions, union contracts and the politicians in Springfield, and they did not address the fact that they have lost tens of millions of dollars on their "Business Type Activities - airport, ballpark and convention center" in the few past years (and these losses will continue).

They did not address the $240 million in debt that they have for these activities that they will need to pay for. In the past 10 years the mayor and trustees have increased the city's debt from $30 million to $307 million which comes to over $4K per resident.

How do they plan to pay for that debt if sales tax revenue cannot even support their regular governmental activities?

The mayor and trustees who approved these money-losing "Business Activities" instead of focusing on real government activities (police, fire, roads, water etc.) should resign before we give them another $23.7 million to waste.

They have shown over the past 10 years they do not know how to effectively manage our tax resources. They know how to borrow and spend. So they need to step aside.

Russell Dahl

Schaumburg