The Town’s decision to mail out bag tags with their 2024 tax assessments at the end of January, has resulted in a one-month delay for homeowners getting their tags. This decision was made with no provisions to cover the delay except to assume tax payers would pay for additional tags.
The town took this approach to save itself about $10,000 in additional postal costs. However, in doing so they put significant additional cost on the tax payer. Under this plan, each home is expected to buy an additional four tags at $4.00 each. Covering the gap comes to $16.00 a month. With 5902 residences eligible for the tax levy taxpayers had to pay out an extra $94,434 so that the town could save itself about $10,000.
There were a number of other options the town could have chosen in this situation. For example, the best solution “for everyone” would have been to allow the first bag to be free for the month of January. Under this plan, the town could have sent out 46 rather than 50 bag tags with the property tax notices. If this tax is to continue into 2025, the town could have adopted a no tag policy for this January and mailed out all 50 tags to cover next January’s requirement. Unfortunately, in this case, the solution the town adopted is one that only works for the town.
This short-sighted approach has caused financial stress for many who are currently living paycheck to paycheck. Unfortunately, it could have been avoided with a little forward planning and some compassion. Had the town done this, a situation that worked for both the town and its residents could have been accommodated.
To remedy this situation, the town should reimburse all eligible taxpayers for the cost of the service they have pay twice for in January.
Tony Balasevicius
Greater Napanee