The Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce wants Davidson County residents’ property taxes to be hiked 32 percent.
The chamber is urging the Metro Council to vote for Mayor John Cooper’s budget that includes a 32 percent property tax increase, the Nashville Business Journal reported.
The chamber’s board endorsed the budget in an announcement Monday and a letter to council members.
The chamber’s 40-member board, led by Pinnacle Bank chairman Rob McCabe, is a roster replete with prominent executives and entrepreneurs — representing most of Nashville’s most influential companies and industries.
The chamber, with more than 2,000 members in the Greater Nashville region, is a notable business voice now weighing into a debate that will culminate by the end of the month. If the council does not approve an alternative budget, Cooper’s proposal becomes law with the July 1 start of the new fiscal year.
Cooper’s proposed budget totals $2.447 billion, the city said.
Metro Finance estimates that the city will experience a $470 million revenue decline over a 16-month time frame due to the impact of COVID-19 and the March tornado. The decline in revenue during Q4 of fiscal year 2020 required Metro to cut expenditures and spend down remaining fund balances, leaving Metro with only $12 million of fund balances at the end of FY20.
The financial impact of the tornado and COVID-19 on Q4 and FY21 require a budget that increases the property tax rate by $1.00, raising the current rate of $3.155 up to $4.155. Over the past 25 years, Metro’s combined GSD/USD property tax rate has averaged $4.30.
This is not the first time the chamber has supported government taxation of citizens and businesses — the chamber was a major backer of former Mayor Megan Barry’s $9 billion transit plan that failed 2-1 in a public referendum in 2017, The Tennessee Star previously reported.
The Star reported that Marc Hill, Chief Policy Officer at the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce, tweeted, “#LetsMoveNashville transit plan is the result of years of work, tens of thousands of citizen engagements. Thank you to Vice Mayor Briley and Metro Council members who are providing strong leadership to put the plan to a May 1 vote to let the people of Nashville decide.”
The chamber had ties to the Citizens for Greater Mobility PAC, which supported the transit plan.
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Jason M. Reynolds has more than 20 years’ experience as a journalist at outlets of all sizes.
Photo “John Cooper” by John Cooper.
I can’t see we are ‘broke’ 😱because the Mayor has not done his job to show the incoming revenue TAXES that the city has earned and where it went!!!!!!! Quite frankly where did the 3 days of revenue earned from the draft go? It was reported that Nashville earned 6X’S the revenue than ANY OTHER CITY EVER!!! And what about the 1.6 million a day the Mayor’s office said we earn on a normal day? I smell a bunch of 💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩🤢
Will the increase in property taxes bother the wealthy members of the Chamber of Commerce? Of course not.
Will it hurt those on a fixed income, the mom&pop store owners and the poor? Will it hurt the young makers of music in Music City? You bet.
Does the Chamber of Commerce care? Obviously not.
Sounds like time for the state legislators to freeze property taxes for ALL senior citizens not just those with income below some artificially set threshold. like is done in Texas. Only way to protect us living on fixed incomes.
How many of the 40 member board will be impacted (lives in Davidson County) by this massive tax increase? How many of the Board Members are what would be considered “wealthy” where an additional $750.00 – $1200 out of pocket expense (higher taxes) would be insignificant. The business sector will simply pass it on to their customers resulting in “double” taxation for the citizens. The citizens of Nashville have been negatively impacted by recent events just like the city government has & they adapt by tightening their belt. It’s time the city government to do likewise.
This is a COC and bull story! Of course the Chamber of Commies (COC) supports this budget.
The City needs to have higher tax revenues so they can borrow more money, so they can spend it on crazy COC ideas like soccer stadiums, electric triple decker busses, so they have to raise taxes, so they can……funnel more money to the COC cronies!
I wonder how many of the members of the Chamber of Commies have personally benefited off of the backs of hard working Nashvillians for years AND don’t actually live in Nashville?
Kevin, don’t you have to wonder how many of these big shots actually live in Davidson County. I figure a lot of them live in the Brentwood area.
Well, if they turn Nashville into Chicago, may all the Yankees will stop moving here?
Well put!
The taxpayers are to pay for Coopers and previous administrations mismanagement of funds. Cooper is a disaster. Cooper deserves nothing, he has been a terrible leader since in office and he will continue to be. He has done nothing positive for Nashville. With the tax increases he will fund his special groups, and very little new for the masses, just a continued misuse of funds. Along with the clowns that are the Metro council.