Paying My Property Taxes With A Smile And A Penny Left Over

Paul always tells people to "stop whining and pay their property taxes."  So today I went to the City-County Building and took my mortgage  company's escrow check and paid.  Usually I need to write an additional check for several hundred dollars to cover the difference between what's been escrowed and what's owed; it's a rough gauge of how taxes have risen since last year, when the escrow calculation was made.  This year I owed an additional $9.99 over the escrow check.

So that's pretty good news, right?  The City of Madison, Dane County, and the Metropolitan Madison School District must have held the line on expenses, and the property tax base must still be going up.  Well, if you're a Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reader, the news that the "Median Property Tax Bill in State Up $7"  has bad connotations, and Governor Doyle is always to blame in the J-S, Mike Plaisted writes.

Finding 12 minutes on a parking meter right in front of the building and no other taxpayers in line ahead of me at noontime, I was in such a good mood that I told the clerk in the City Treasurer's Office that the City could keep the penny change from my $10 bill.  She refused my generosity, saying that it would screw up their balance at the end of the day. I looked for a penny tray like at Stop-N-Go, but no such thing exists at the City Treasurer's office.  So I left the penny on the counter for the next taxpayer. 

By the way, the front of the City-County Building needs some updated signage: the left side of the doors has a metal "Dane County" with the ghostly word "Courthouse" outlined, with the metal "Courthouse" sign removed since the new Courthouse opened.  The right side has "Madison City Hall," a name that nobody ever uses.  So from the outside it's the "Dane County Madison City Hall," which makes no sense. Anyone got a good idea for a new name for an ugly building?  Or know a deep pocket wanting naming rights, like the County managed with the Alliant Energy Center?

- Barry Orton

Comments

[Brian]

The thing about property taxes is that the corporate share used to be much higher. Individual homeowners have had to take up the slack for giving breaks to corporations. And for what? So they would keep their jobs in this state? Has it worked?
What is the ratio of taxes paid by individuals v. corporations now and compared to previous years going back say 35 years? And why is that stat not on people's minds and part of every major media discussion about property taxes?
It's all in the framing, folks.