City: Keep buildings on tax rolls

Published 9:00 am Wednesday, March 10, 2004

I can’t believe what I read in last Wednesday’s paper. Is there something in the water in Oak Harbor? Wells Fargo lays off 90 people and moves out of two prime buildings and the city wants to turn them into a civic center? Let’s take a look at the situation:

Scenario 1: The city helps the building owners find new businesses to move in, the owners continue to pay taxes, the new businesses pay taxes, the new businesses might hire some or all of the 90 unemployed who will pay taxes and buy groceries, clothes, etc.

Scenario 2: The city buys the buildings with taxpayer money, the city remodels the buildings with taxpayer money, the city pays to run the civic centers with taxpayer money, the city raises taxes to cover the lost revenue and pay for everything, the unemployed people collect unemployment checks.

This is not rocket science, folks, it should be obvious to the most casual observer to vote for scenario 2, after all, the unemployed people will need some place to meet and exchange coupons to stretch their unemployment checks.

Give me a break.

Rick Kiser

Oak Harbor