Jasper County Democrat, Volume 22, Number 60, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 October 1919 — ‘PENNYWISE; POUND FOOLISH’ [ARTICLE]

‘PENNYWISE; POUND FOOLISH’

In Reducing Tax Levies to Fool the Taxpayer. The state board of tax commissioners cut the Jasper county levy for gravel road repair from 8 cents to 6 cento, or 2 cents lees than the county council, after considering the matter very carefully, deemed the lowest possible figure it' - could be cut to and give us anything like a reasonable sum to keep up the repair of our stone roads. The council cut the estimate of the county commissioners from $50,000 to $35,000,. and now the by the state tax commissioners chips off about SB,OOO or $9,000 from the latter figures. The Democrat believed that it was not necessary to levy a $50,000 tax for gravel or stone road repair, but floes think that $25,000 to $27,000 is too little. There is no economy in letting our stone roads, which have costs hundreds of thousands of dollars, go to destruction simply to please three men sitting in the state house at Indianapolis that they may make it appear favorable for the new tax law. ,

It should be remembered that the SIO,OOO to $12,000 heretofore received from the county’s share of automobile license fees and which went into the road repair fund. Is cut off under the new law and goes 7 to the state highway fund. The greater part of the reductions made In the various towns and townships in the county from the levies as fixed by the taxing officers thereof is in the school funds, arad these reductions will greatly embarrass the schools, it is said. While we all want as low a tax levy ah is consistent with the necessities that must be taken care of, there Is such a thing as being “penny wise ,dnd pound foolish.’’ Because of the unreasonable boosting of the valuations as fixed by the township assessors and passed by the county board of review, taxes in Rensselaer and Jasper county are going to be much higher next year than they are this—that is, while the levy is lower, the total amount one will have to pay, because of the thribling of valuation, will be much more than he pays this year on the same amount of property.