WAL-MART TURNS ITS BACK ON SCHOOLS…
I attended the Warren local school district in southeastern Ohio. We had really good schools because of the property taxes paid by Union Carbide and other large factories in the district. Without those taxes, my experience would have been very different.
Thank goodness I didn’t have to depend upon Wal-Mart.
From this morning’s New York Times:
Wal-Mart doesn’t believe just in lower prices — it believes in lower property taxes, too. The big discount chain has sought to reduce the property taxes it pays on 35 percent of its stores and 40 percent of its distribution centers, according to a report to be released today by Good Jobs First, a group that is critical of Wal-Mart.
Over all, the company wins lower taxes in half the challenges it brings, the group found. Because it had not seen the report, Wal-Mart did not wish to comment in detail, said a spokesman, John Simley.
Mr. Simley added that the study should be viewed with caution because “they are a union-funded group.” Wal-Mart has had tense relations with unions, which have criticized pay and working conditions there.
Good Jobs First said that less than 3 percent of its financing came from unions, with the bulk from foundations, including the Rockefeller and Ford foundations. The group said a donor, whom it declined to identify, paid for the tax study; the donor has no union affiliation, it said.
Both homeowners and businesses have a legal right to challenge their tax assessments, and it is commonplace for them to do so. But the Good Jobs First report questioned whether Wal-Mart was damaging public schools and other tax-supported government services with an overly aggressive strategy of pursuing reductions.
The group sampled 10 percent of the 2,833 Wal-Mart retail stores open at the start of 2005 and found that the company had challenged property taxes at 35 percent of them. The report also looked closely at Texas, where Wal-Mart challenged assessments at 83 percent of 400 stores. Good Jobs First said it looked at records of all Wal-Mart distribution centers across the country and found that lower property tax bills were sought for 40 percent of them.
Yes, yes. I know that Wal-Mart has great back-to-school sales and offers teachers discounts and all the rest.
But what percentage of its full property tax bill do you think those discount equal?
[...] Jeff has already brought your attention to the NYT article on the Good Jobs First study of Wal-Mart’s property tax appeals. I, in my [...]