May 16
The Columbus County manager’s budget proposal calls for a 12 cent tax increase that brings Columbus County’s property tax rate up to 88.5 cent per $100 value. One cent equals about $300,000 in revenue for the county. What are your thoughts about the proposed increase? Do you think the county should cut back on spending? If so where?
May 17th, 2007 at 12:46 pm
The whole county government is in shambles!! The county commisioners and the co manager are all clowns!! I have been a life long resident of Columbus County, but have had enough!! Moving my family to an area where schools are better and where the economy is not stagnant. The people of col. county better wake up!! Do something about the clowns!!
May 17th, 2007 at 1:18 pm
wow. you…are…crazy. almost every rural county in north carolina are facing the same challenges. i’ve read the budget online and its pretty thin as it is. if you want to stop paying sheriff’s deputies, picking up trash, etc…, then fine. but besides that, where are we gonna make up the difference? business aren’t coming east and they aren’t going to rural areas. it is a lot easier to call them clowns then it is to actually face reality.
May 17th, 2007 at 11:10 pm
More, more, and more that’s all we hear around here. I’m paying water tax’s on two lots in district ll where we they say thier not enough homes to run the line. But they dont mine taking our money. walk in any county office do we really need all these people. if they will look around I’m sure they could fine many things they could cut. I was a manager for 30 years when we were told to cut we had no choice. they need to make hard choices and do what should have been done years ago.
May 18th, 2007 at 12:31 pm
what good does it serve to pay taxes at all if the services we are paying for are crippled? firing people doesn’t solve the problem. you’d have to fire so many people and cut so many services that the county would be in even worse shape. crime is on the rise. do you want to take sheriff’s deputies off the street? columbus county’s population is getting older. do you want to make it harder for the elderly to get medicare benefits? the county needs a quality workforce. are you proposing they fire teachers and administrators?
May 21st, 2007 at 3:00 pm
For all of North Carolina,the fathers of these children receiving medicaid benefits should have to reimburse the cost.Yes they would have to be identified and if working under the table,so their income cannot be verified,fine the people they are doing work for.Yes, someone knows who they are working for.
May 21st, 2007 at 6:44 pm
are you saying that the fathers of these children are somehow dumping them on the system? for the vast majority of cases, that isn’t what is happening. healthcare is expensive. if you’re kid has an extended stay in the hospital you could end up owing well over $15,000. for a father who works hard but doesn’t get healthcare coverage, that could be more than half of a year’s salary. most people aren’t on medicaid because they want to be. they’re on it because they need to be.
May 22nd, 2007 at 1:50 pm
I am saying the majority of the fathers of children on medicaid are not in the picture.The mothers are the responsible parent,the fathers pay very little in child support and try to get that decreased,because they are getting paid cash working under the table.dont tell me you are not aware of this.I know how expensive health care is.Are you aware that their are men who father children by more than one woman and do not take responsibility for these children?
May 22nd, 2007 at 8:02 pm
i do realize that there are poor fathers out there. and it is a crime, literally. it is against the law for them not to financially help their children. the only problem is if the commissioners start cutting services, there won’t be any sheriff’s deputies to round up these deadbeat dads and force them to pay. or, arrest the employers who pay them under the table.
May 23rd, 2007 at 12:42 pm
I am not saying cut services,force the dead beat dads to pay up.
May 26th, 2007 at 11:53 am
Until the people of Columbus County get interested enough in Medicaid and start lobbying our state legislators to do what 49 other states have done and get the counties out from under the rising Medicaid burden, we will continue to see the need for such increases in local property tax. Yes, I said “need.” The cost of operating county government increases just like all other operations. We shouldn’t expect to pay less - we pay more for everything else.