Down The Sewer Pipe – Politically Speaking

One of the most often things I hear, about the cost of government, is that taxes and fees are to high. I don’t necessarily disagree with the statement. As an elected official to a public office, part of your job is explaining to people what it is that they are paying for, and why they are paying for it.

Cities, counties, townships, states, and the Federal government all have taxes and fees that they charge to the population of the USA. Feds get first choice, and all other jurisdictions fall under them. What this means to local communities is the fees for roads, sanitary sewer, storm sewer, potable water, size and placement of fire hydrants, road repairs may (be in part) dictated by a government different than to what you are elected to.

If the Federal government raises fuel taxes, and the state does the same, then the question is why would your county or your city impose additional fuel taxes? in some places in the state of Oregon (where I live) fuel taxes are almost 50% of the price of a gallon of fuel. The effect is that everything that your population buys will cost more.

The question is not so much as should there be a fuel tax as much as it is “why are we paying all this money and the streets are full of holes”. Normally municipalities don’t raise fuel taxes every year. These, like building permit fees, or raises water and sewer fees are done in fits and starts. But it is impossible to live at todays level on yesterday’s dollar.

As an elected official you need to be able to explain why all of your cities fees are so high, what value the population receives in exchange for the fees that they pay, how much other governments require the city to pay (for instance a county may impose waste quality standards that exceed the Federal requirement, which requires the city to raise their sanitary sewer rate to cover the cost).

The reality is sanitary sewer rates should advance by a dollar per connection per year. If they did the population would not be required to pay an increase of 4 to 5 % every two years. The only other option is to inquire, of the people you represent, what do they NOT want the city to do as applied to services.