Live from Music Row Wednesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed Tennessee Star Senior Reporter Laura Baigert to the newsmakers line.
During the second hour, Baigert discussed the two grassroots groups opposing Mayor John Cooper’s 32% property tax increase and how that will affect Davidson County homeowners and renters.
Leahy: I’m talking with our ace reporter covering Capitol Hill, who is our senior reporter Laura Baigert. Her story about citizens fighting back against Mayor Cooper’s proposed 32% property tax increase is up now at The Tennessee Star. tennesseestar.com. Laura, this is I think a typical grassroots series of groups that are opposing it. We don’t have just one group, we have two groups. Tell us about the two groups and what they are trying to do.
Baigert: So one is a little more clandestine and maybe wanting to be very inclusive with folks and they have a really slick website that walks through what the impact of this property tax is going to be to a homeowner and a renter on their tax bill. So if you have an average $300,000 house with a 32% property tax increase you are going to see an increase in your property tax bill of about $750.
And it talks a little bit about how renters are going to feel the impact and probably even more severely because these property management companies and owners of these apartments and all don’t just mark up rent by the amount that the property tax increase is. They get to throw a percent on it and throw a few bucks in their own pockets along the way.
Leahy: Now this first group is called LowTax4Nash.com. And what is that they want people to do?
Baigert: They have identified things that could be cut right out of the budget. They have eight different proposals that can cut the $332 million out of the budget that is causing the 32% property tax increase. They have very specific things that you can identify that will tell Mayor Cooper and the council with an email that will be automatically be sent to them when you pick things that you think you can live without.
It actually shows what the impact on your tax bill will be based on those average property values. So it’s pretty slick by showing that there are definitely places that can be cut in the budget that apparently Mayor Cooper hasn’t put any effort into doing.
Leahy: Yes. There is no effort by the mayor to cut anything. In fact, he’s increasing the budget in this terrible economic period by five percent.
Baigert: Right.
Leahy: Now there’s another group and they are also on the web called NoTax4Nash.com. You can either go low or you can go no. That’s on the web at NoTax4Nash.com. Tell us about that group.
Baigert: So that’s being spearheaded by Michelle Foreman who grew up in the Nashville area and who I interviewed yesterday and she is seeing that this has long been a problem in Nashville and its time to do something about it and she felt that it was particularly unconscionable and egregious that Mayor Cooper would dump this property tax increase on people when so many have lost their jobs right now and have no revenue.
And she has a healthcare background and sees that people could get back to work but the mayor hasn’t allowed them too. She started this effort spearheading and working with some other people. I think Carol Swain may be involved and she’s been on the show talking about it as well and some other folks.
They actually met with Mayor Cooper last week and pointed out some things that should be able to be cut. They could actually take them right off the LowTax4Nash website. And Michelle did indicate that Mayor Cooper was amenable to making some budget cuts. So they have another meeting scheduled and we’ll see how that goes.
Now, what people need to know who are going to be impacted by it that you don’t reach out to your councilperson and tell them you are not happy with this and tell them what you can live with it and not live with in terms of the tax increase, the mayor’s budget will automatically go into effect June 30. So unless somebody proposes something else and that gets passed by the council you are stuck with this. The time to act is now.
Leahy: Yes. And so you can go to the NoTax4Nash.com website and sign up for an email alert. The action item they want to do is have you talk to your local council member is that right?
Baigert: Right. And that website will help direct you there. The LowTax4Nash.com website, once you pick out what you think you can live without it will automatically generate an email to the council members and the mayor giving your feedback.
Leahy: From your reporting Laura, the key that you just mentioned is there has to be an alternative proposal to the mayor’s proposal.
Baigert: That’s right.
Leahy: The mayor has not yet submitted his proposal but we’re thinking it’s basically going to be a 32% property tax increase with virtually no cuts. Do we see on the horizon any possible alternative to be submitted?
Baigert: Well, I would think some of the council members will look at something. Bob Mendes who is the chairman of the finance may look at something. But some people are actually talking about more than 32%. The champion for the lowest taxes you are going to get is Steve Glover who is a council member-at-large.
He is the one who has been spearheading the effort and has been very vocal in terms of criticizing this kind of thing. In fact, at one of the rally’s on Lower Broadway when folks were protesting to get back open, Steve went out there and talked about the tax increase and how you’re going to have to fight that. Especially when so many of these people are out of work and their business has been closed down and they have no revenue. And yet you’re going to hoist this bill on them. Only the government can justify something like that.
Leahy: Yes. It doesn’t make a lot of sense. The economy is crashing. Private companies here like restaurants are laying people off left and right. Hotels are laying people off left and right. But the city government is not cutting expenses. From most everything I can see they are increasing spending by five percent. And they think that the businesses that got hit so hard are the ones that should bear the burden. It just doesn’t seem fair or equitable to many people.
Baigert: No. It doesn’t. So there are two points. The budget last year was $2.3 billion. This year it is $2.4 billion even though Mayor Cooper’s presentation to the council says that he knows they are going to be over $200 million short in revenue against this year’s budget. If they started with this year’s budget and tacked on five percent. How do you do that when you know you are going to be short? You are using the wrong baseline to start with.
Leahy: I’ll tell you a story about that. Way back in my early youth I was a Democrat. Waaay back. And back in the late 1970s, I worked as a budget analyst in Washington, D.C. for the Environmental Protection Agency. And this was when Jimmy Carter had introduced the idea of “zero-base budgeting.” But a Democrats idea of zero-based budgeting is exactly what you said. (Baigert laughs) They didn’t start off with zero.
Baigert: Right.
Leahy: They increased last year’s budget by five percent and called that zero. That’s what you call Democrat common core math. (Laughs)
Baigert: Yep. And when you are doing that at a time whereas you said the reason that they are in a shortfall is largely because of their tourism business that’s come to a screeching halt and yet you are asking those very same people, we had a story on this about how Nashville was one of the hardest-hit metropolitan areas in the COVID-19 crisis. I looked at many many other budgets, most of them are not increasing anything. Most of them are cutting for the other 25 to 30 metropolitan largest cities in the United States. Nobody is talking about a tax increase.
Leahy: Well Jim Cooper apparently is. (Laughs)
Baigert: Well Jim too and John Cooper.
Leahy: Thank you for that correction.
Baigert: Don’t you have to wonder a little bit about the connection there though? Maybe because of that D.C. connection they are looking at if it goes bad enough we could push for a bailout.
Leahy: Well I think that’s probably what their plan is. Laura Baigert, thanks so much for coming on this morning. We’d like to have you here every week. And it’s easier by phone but we’d love to have you come back in the studio again if you’d do that.
Baigert: Sure will. Thank you, Michael.
Listen to the full second hour:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
