12-05-2012, 09:08 AM
2 main points - household sewage is no longer "all organic". It is EVERYTHING that goes into your drain. Todays sewage includes drugs, makeup, creams & potions, pest poisons, cleaners, paper & plastic waste, and many other chemicals that flow into the drains of the houses....
and) There are ways around the burden being imposing. Both Carol & I have highlighted ways in which jurisdictions do that:
1. Mandate a Health & safety upgrade at the time of title transfer (ours was a newer Health Dept. code that required Tertiary rather than primary septic, Carol had the example of the sewer...
2. Mandate the upgrade & levy property taxes to obtain the funds for compliance.
Of course, there still are those property owners that would still not comply, & this county does have a population body that does not pay taxes, so until that can o worms is untangled...
I still have a hard time with those that will pay a fairly high price per acre (you still can get ag land on the mainland for far lower cost - there are still many US areas that go for around $1 - 2k /acre for ag land & $10K for residential) & then think that they shouldn't have to pay anything more....that it is an unfair burden that is being placed on them....
I have always lived in an ag zoned area, yet now live in a residential area that has many homes with property taxes of under $100/year.... to me that is totally absurd -esp. when the last unincorporated ag area we lived in had a tax RATE that was 10X what this county has (oh, & our unincorporated taxes had no local roads - all ours to maintain - no library, no beaches, no pool, no public transportation, no police, no fire or emergency dept...all of those we paid extra to use.... all we got for that rate was a small sheriffs dept & public schools (granted, really GOOD schools, but we had no kids....) We also had similar state income taxes & higher sales tax....so no wonder I think this is a financial nirvana & no one should complain about the tax man here!
and) There are ways around the burden being imposing. Both Carol & I have highlighted ways in which jurisdictions do that:
1. Mandate a Health & safety upgrade at the time of title transfer (ours was a newer Health Dept. code that required Tertiary rather than primary septic, Carol had the example of the sewer...
2. Mandate the upgrade & levy property taxes to obtain the funds for compliance.
Of course, there still are those property owners that would still not comply, & this county does have a population body that does not pay taxes, so until that can o worms is untangled...
I still have a hard time with those that will pay a fairly high price per acre (you still can get ag land on the mainland for far lower cost - there are still many US areas that go for around $1 - 2k /acre for ag land & $10K for residential) & then think that they shouldn't have to pay anything more....that it is an unfair burden that is being placed on them....
I have always lived in an ag zoned area, yet now live in a residential area that has many homes with property taxes of under $100/year.... to me that is totally absurd -esp. when the last unincorporated ag area we lived in had a tax RATE that was 10X what this county has (oh, & our unincorporated taxes had no local roads - all ours to maintain - no library, no beaches, no pool, no public transportation, no police, no fire or emergency dept...all of those we paid extra to use.... all we got for that rate was a small sheriffs dept & public schools (granted, really GOOD schools, but we had no kids....) We also had similar state income taxes & higher sales tax....so no wonder I think this is a financial nirvana & no one should complain about the tax man here!