Around Des Moines

(Des Moines, IA, May 5, 2008) Ask your elected officials if it is okay to use a cash advance check from one of your credit cards to pay the minimum amount due on another card. Then ask that same official if it is okay to use funds from one source of government to pay for a project by another level of government. Most likely the elected official would express concern about the former and praise for the latter. Yet, in the end, the source of all those government funds is the same: the taxpayer. In theory and in practice, I favor using taxes from one source to pay for essential needs in another part of a jurisdiction. For example, I have no problem with some of my federal tax dollars earned in Iowa going to pay for food stamps in Louisiana. However, I have major objections to one level of government telling me something is free because another level of government is paying for it.

Take the new D-Line shuttle that starts today in Des Moines as an example. This shuttle will run from the Des Moines Public School’s Central Campus at about 18th and Grand to the state Capitol at approximately East 13th and East Grand. The shuttle will run the loop in approximately 10-minute intervals, from 7:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m., Monday through Friday. It will be free to riders. In contrast, riders of the regular DART buses that cover that same run and a few additional blocks on their regularly-scheduled hourly runs, from approximately 6:00 a.m. to 10 p.m. weekdays and 7:00 to 6:00 on weekends, will see the fare for that zone go from $0.25 to $0.50 on June 1, 2008. DART and city officials sing the praise of this new simple-and-free shuttle. Alas, whether a regular DART route bus or a shiny new downtown shuttle, you and I are the ones paying the price and it is not free.

Similarly, I was not happy when the state legislature passed the $0.01 property tax/school construction bill this past session. If that sales tax were a permanent source of funding for operations of schools, I would have been a supporter. As it is, the construction tax bill has consequences not mentioned by its proponents. Yes, money from retail-rich parts of the state will help construct school-related buildings in less well-financed districts. However, if those districts do not vote in favor of the new school construction, they can use that money to lower property taxes that are already lower than those in many retail-oriented metropolitan areas. In other words, residents of Des Moines who shop within the city may soon be paying for property-tax reduction of corporate hog confinements across Iowa. Furthermore, another expense of the housing bubble was that governmental projects also cost more as construction workers and building materials went to residential construction, thereby raising prices for all projects. That means the General Assembly increased the cost of the Polk County courthouse reconstruction, should voters approve it at a later time. (Supporters of a new courthouse have been arguing since their defeat that the voters’ rejection of their plan increased the cost by millions of dollars due to the inevitable delay. One more thing on that school bill. Many of Des Moines’ big companies that supported Project Destiny have offices in those smaller communities whose property taxes may be reduced thanks to the state legislature.)

The April 2008 Polk County courthouse vote also suffered from the fact that it was about the prison system, something most people do not think about on a regular basis, unlike the sales taxes associated with Project Destiny. Why should county voters be taxed for something they don’t think they will use? I noticed that in the media discussions about the courthouse vote, the voices that were missing included jurors’ experiences, plus witnesses and victims who had to appear in court, a grieving survivor who had to struggle with probate, and even ex-offenders who were transported between the county jail and the courthouse. How would they improve the facilities? It is also possible that money being spent on new prisons in Iowa helped defeat the courthouse vote, at least subconsciously, but I don’t think that would have been a major factor in anybody’s decision.

The final part of this commentary is the tax levies themselves. I took a look at the levy maps and tables available on the county auditor’s website and was surprised at how much variation there is even within the city of Des Moines. A quick look at the table shows a range of rates from just over 25.13, including a sanitary sewer charge, in parts of Windsor Heights in the West Des Moines school district to over 49.92 in Des Moines in the SE Polk schools district.

M.R. Field was editor of Leading Voices: Iowa.