In a letter appearing in this week’s Sakonnet Times, Tiverton resident Will Newman joins those who apparently believe that politics is about making false accusations to generate hatred against their neighbors.  Hopefully, he has merely been misinformed, and the following responses will ease Mr. Newman’s mind.

Does the Tiverton Taxpayers Association (TTA) win elections with “outside money”?  No.  Our campaigns are entirely funded by people here in our community, supporting the work of dedicated residents.

Does the TTA “favor shutting the high school”?  No.  Actually, we want the school district to improve to such an extent that Little Compton no longer feels compelled to bus its students from one end of Tiverton to the other in order to utilize Portsmouth High School.

Does TTA want to turn “our new library into city offices”?  No.  In fact, the budget the Town Council proposed increased funding to the library.  To the extent that TTA members have suggested plans for the library, the emphasis has been on expanding its activities as a library.

Do we want “normal town services” to “give way to de minimus taxes”?  No.  The budget the council proposed would have increased spending by 5.4%, and the Budget Committee brought it up to 5.9%.  Some people accused us of wanting to spend too much!

Additionally, the first draft of a long-term plan presented as part of the council’s budget proposal showed a path toward stable growth and controlled tax increases.  Meanwhile, we resolved a challenging negotiation to address ongoing staffing issues in the fire department, we approved an update to our emergency services communication and information technology, we fast-tracked the purchase of a new ambulance, we supported most of the Town Administrator’s proposed capital plan, and we’re working to open town offices during lunch hours and other times when residents can actually get to Town Hall.  In short, we’re working to improve services and make them more efficient.

People told me to expect it, but I’m still surprised by the willingness of some to spread falsehoods for political purposes.  It’s a shame.  When whisper campaigns spread false information, people aren’t even receiving one side of the story; they’re hearing fiction.  If you ever have any questions about what the Town Council is or is not doing or what TTA is working toward, please do not hesitate to contact me.  My email address is justin@justinkatz.com and my cell phone number is (401) 835-7156.

When it comes to budgets, with the possibility that the town will take hundreds of thousands of dollars more from taxpayers than even the Town Council and Budget Committee want, the numbers can become confusing.  It helps to narrow the question down and answer the pieces one by one.  For this post, I’ll address the question of whether both budgets use the new casino gambling revenue for tax relief.

They do not.  As the following chart shows, Budget #2 will collect almost exactly the same amount of tax as the town is collecting this year.  That means it is spending every penny of casino revenue.  Budget #1, on the other hand, lowers taxes by $562,218, which is direct tax savings from the casino’s revenue.

Both budgets will lower the tax rate, but that is because the total value of property in the town went up, so the tax burden is distributed more broadly.  However, in future years, the casino revenue will already be built into the taxes.

Sanford Mantell and the Town Council and School Committee members who obviously helped him put together his budget petition are not backing down.  They insist that they did not make a math error that they obviously made. Even more, they are saying that the town treasurer signed off on their calculations, which she says she did not do.

At a special Town Council meeting on Wednesday, Council member Tricia Hilton waved around a piece of paper claiming that multiple accountants had reviewed Budget #2 and found its math to be correct.  On the paper (she said) were different ways to calculate the total taxes for the budget, accounting for “abatements,” which are taxes that the town doesn’t expect to be able to collect.

Every year, the Budget Committee accounts for abatements by figuring out the total tax levy, based on the spending allowed by the budget, and then adding the assumed abatements.  This way, the town is allowed to collect more tax than it needs so that it won’t matter that some amount of it won’t come in.  This year, the number was $30,000.  Mantell and Company, all of whom should have known how this works, instead added the $30,000 in total spending.

That was incorrect and may create budgeting problems if Budget #2 wins, but it isn’t the most embarrassing error or the biggest problem.  The following image shows the relevant column of Hilton’s paper and language for Budget #2 as it will appear on the ballot.  The two circled numbers should be the same, but they are not.  If voters approve this budget, the town won’t be able to collect enough money to cover the spending that voters will have authorized.

In order to mislead people, Hilton’s table shows $37,872,048 as a “subtotal,” but it is not.  It is the total tax.  Abatements can come from both motor vehicle taxes and real and tangible property taxes.  If you add Mantell’s numbers together, they do not equal the total.

Worse, because voters will have approved a higher amount of spending than the budget calls for, the gap will be twice as large.