Carney Addresses the Statewide Property Tax
In what has become an annual custom, Mark Brainard, grand poobah of Delaware Technical and Community College, is asking the General Assembly for a new statewide property tax to raise money for upkeep of its facilities. And a lot of lawmakers seem ready to give it to him.
Senate Bill 50, sponsored by frequently-used tool Sen. Harris McDowell, has a worrisome number of co-sponsors, from both parties. Their concern for the school’s physical plants might be laudable, but they are being buffaloed into supporting a good idea for a bad cause.
Republicans greeted the proposal like news of an Ebola outbreak. Sen. Colin Bonini reliably attacked, predicting the rate would increase faster than inflation in Venezuela. CRI raised the specter of wingnut welfare rating systems frowning on such a move.
So when Gov. Carney, proving he lacks the sense God promised a beagle, visited the Crossroads Restaurant with three Republican lawmakers Tuesday, of course somebody wanted to know his position on it. It wasn’t lunchtime yet, but word salad was served. Per WDEL’s Mark Fowser:
“The concern I have is it’s competition with the local school district’s tax base,” Carney said. “Notwithstanding the fact that we have very low property taxes – among the lowest in the country – it’s always difficult to get a property tax increase for local education expenses.”
Okay, so he’s not a word guy. I’ll try to guess what he means.
Carney is incorrect to say it’s “competition” with the local school districts. This tax would be applied countywide in each county; school taxes are applied district by district, in a couple of cases crossing county lines. What I think he means is that we’d be dipping into the same well as K-12 schools, which would be at a disadvantage because they must pass public referendums, while this law would allow DelTech to raise tax rates at its own discretion, as Vo-Tech districts already do.
Carney is right about Delaware’s property taxes — residents in only a handful of states pay lower property taxes than Delawareans. And he’s right about the difficulty of passing local referendums to pay the district portion of education expenses. So why don’t we kill two birds with this stone and adopt a statewide property tax dedicated to paying for education funds for low-income students?
That’s a rhetorical question, really, because public support for new taxes scores only slightly higher than Ebola, making this a high hurdle even in a non-election year. Brainard’s sob stories about leaking roofs and cracked sidewalks don’t tell me anything other than DelTech must be poorly managed indeed if nobody planned for predictable maintenance needs all these years.
I have no idea if this idea finally will go somewhere. Hearings are next week, and I’m sure El Som will fill you in on the political outlook. I can only tell you it’s a viable solution, but not for the problem it was designed to address. As GOP Rep. Mike Smith says on the WDEL tape at the link, there are other ways to get the money to fix roofs. Finding the money to fix K-12 education is more important.
I should also mention the size of the cojones it takes to not merely ask the General Assembly for money but to tell them how to raise it as well. That’s why Lonnie George gave himself the big bucks.
As you point out, it has lots of co-sponsors, from both parties. I’d love to see some tax raising enthusiasm directed at the people and companies that have been getting a virtual free ride for 30 years.
Excellent point. Why does no news organization focus on this?
As bonkers as I think this proposal is, and backwards as I think it is for Del Tech to come hat in hand after some of the things they do, I thought you all would be leading the charge to fund.
I mean, if we cant even fix up their buildings, how are we going to give all the student debt or give everyone a free college degree (in addition to free health care for all)?
If this blog is not going to fight for quality and free college education, who is?
Where is Kerri on this? I would love to get her thoughts on this.
Does anybody know if Network DE thinks this is a good idea? Or do they oppose it and want to see college education remain half baked and still largely out of reach for Delawareans?
Basic maintenance is something every business I’ve ever been involved with budgets for. If the morons who run DelTech can’t even get that right, why should we trust them to educate Delawareans?
This isn’t about funding DelTech. It’s about the power grab the school is attempting here. They can get funding the same way UD and DSU do — ask for it from the general budget, but that’s too much work.
The business of running a college is not education. Your inability to see the difference is troubling.
Alby your inability to see the difference between the funding options for the State’s only community college and UD is troubling. Community colleges rarely have $100 million dollar endowments while charging $30k in tuition.
This isn’t about “funding options.” UD gets north of $100 million in public funding without having a special tax.
Your inability to see that this is about a mismanaged money pit is troubling.
They also have a $1 Billion endowment and don’t serve a lot of poor kids and can charge whatever they want in tuition as a result. This comparison is apples and oranges.
I am not opposed to DelTech raising the money through a bond issue. I am opposed to a dedicated tax. Enough with the fucking straw man.
The place needs fumigation.
As long as I’ve lived in Delaware, I’ve listened to the rumors of politically connected hangers on getting jobs at DelTech. I suspect this accounts for the sponsors and the kid gloves this is being handled with.
Whenever talk turns to our public schools it’s always “We can’t just throw money at it.” But that seems to be exactly what’s being done here.
If they legitimately need more $$, put it in the budget request and let the honorables vote it up or down.
Rumors, my butt. There are SO many confirmed stories of legislators and relatives of grand poobahs who have ‘worked’ at Del-Tech that it’s not even funny.
Their numbers may even outnumber those of the ex-cops in the General Assembly…although Reps. Larry Mitchell and John Van Sant before him have enjoyed second (well, third) careers as Directors of Security at Del-Tech, so they’re both twofers.
Oh, and add newly-elected State Rep. Bill Bush to the list. He’s on the Board Of Trustees, and he voted against Mark Brainard’s predecessor to be the head of Del-Tech. A Lonnie loyalist to the end.
In response to the free education for all person, I support free education for all but if you are a Delawarean with a C average you can already go to Del Tech for free, it’s called the SEED program. So let’s invest more money to make sure all the students are eligible for that by investing in K-12 public school.
If you think this proposal is suspicious and fraught with political peril how about talking about the two million dollar beach front gorilla in the room? That being a state wide reassessment of property values. Talk about a free ride this is another one that just goes on and on. Carney? He remains the clueless poster child for mo’ bettah Dems.
This is dead on arrival from what I hear
You can read the bleatings of ‘Dr.’ Mark Brainard, who is not really a doctor, right here. Yep, he’s the victim of propagandistic opposition:
https://delawarestatenews.net/opinion/commentary-modest-investment-will-enhance-delawares-future/
Yes, after reading this I laughed at how he started with the “people omitting facts/distorting truths” rhetoric, then later tried to frame the funding method as “similar to what the vocational school districts do” by conveniently omitting the following facts:
1. Residents within the vocational districts do not pay tuition in addition to the vo-tech school taxes to send their kids to those schools.
2. grades 1-12 are compulsory; post-secondary education is not.
I’ll start by mentioning that years back after being downsized during the recession, I took a “survival” part-time position @ DelTech. I’ve never seen such a bloated, lazy top-heavy administrative structure with deans, assistant deans, assistants TO deans, etc. yet simultaneously relying on part-time and adjunct slave wage positions to do any real work. The ranks of full-timers are littered with ex-cops and relatives of the politically-connected.
The obvious way to help with deferred maintenance costs is to raise tuition rates – but “Dr.” Brainard doesn’t want to dilute the college’s “we’re cheaper” competitive advantage. Indeed, just look at how their messaging is about touting “70% of our graduates complete their degree debt-free!”
But, instead of raising tuition, every year they pin their hopes on the state-wide “taxation without representation” bill, and every year it doesn’t pass the deferred maintenance bill keeps rising.
People like Tizzy Lockman and Laura Sturgeon need to hear this.
Reassessment — that third rail of Delaware politics — ought to go hand in hand with SB 50. Last reassessment in Sussex was 45 years ago. New Castle in 1984, Kent in 1987. So, if this bill passes, properties would be taxed based on values that are 32 to 45 years out of date — and that’s going to mean that Sussex residents would pay less on this tax than their neighbors to the north.
You can’t have a statewide tax that uses differing bases to bill the taxpayers. (Imagine the howls, for example, if the folks in Sussex paid state income tax based on what they earned in 2018, while folks in Kent and New Castle only had to pay based on what they earned in 1998.)
If you’re a legislator from Kent or New Castle, you should be protecting your constituents by calling for a statewide reassessment now … This tax is a lawsuit waiting to happen. (See DELAWAREANS FOR EDUCATIONAL OPPORTUNITY and NAACP DELAWARE STATE CONFERENCE OF BRANCHES v. CARNEY et al., C.A. No. 2018-0029-VCL, in the Court of Chancery.)
That’s why the tax would be applied county by county, with funds going only to that county’s campus. It’s a horrible plan from start to finish.
That hints at the real solution here — break up the school into three county community colleges, like they do it in the rest of the country. There’s no legitimate need for a statewide community college — in fact, it’s an oxymoron, as the state is not a community.
Yet, with 2 campuses in NCCo (Stanton & George ) and my suspicion that the largest percentage of deferred maintenance costs are for those campuses, wouldn’t NCCo residents still wind up paying more?
Let’s also not forget that not all degree programs/curriculum are available equally at all campuses, so you might theoretically have some Kent (and perhaps even Sussex) residents commuting to NCCo and benefiting from the deferred maintenance improvements while still residing in a county that paid less overall.
“wouldn’t NCCo residents still wind up paying more?”
Seems like it to me, but I haven’t seen the public release of any details.
Yours is not a unique account. I’ve heard the same from other friends and acquaintances. A thorough housecleaning is needed.
“A thorough housecleaning is needed.”
Although full-time positions became available in the dept. I worked in, I never applied. The Dept. head fostered a culture that treated part-time employees as disposable indentured servants not worthy of any professional courtesy. Seeing him select his own nephew for promotion to a position reporting directly to him and HR not batting an eye convinced me the entire institution was bereft of ethics/integrity.
Because this is Delaware, our fear ought to be that splitting DelTech into three parts would create three fiefdoms — little Lonnie George-like principalities staffed with part-time legislators and retired state cops.
I get Alby’s point about how other states organize their community college systems but keep in mind that: (a) all of Delaware is smaller than some counties in Texas; and (b) counties in New York state, among others, often have populations larger than all of Delaware.
My point is … there’s no need to break up DelTech … just find a way to run it well, an finance it well, something the lawmakers who tend to lead the state as if it were a banana republic have little idea of how to accomplish.
A thorough housecleaning would work, too, but in a vacuum I’d prefer three small fiefdoms to a single one large enough to persuade the General Assembly to institute a new tax.
Understood. No one has complained recently about Liechtenstein, Andorra and San Marino having any undue influence on European political affairs.
I see both pluses and minuses regarding splitting DTCC – one of the pluses being the need not to have some high-paying and redundant Director/VP positions in the “Office of the President.”
@b2: It’s not about the “need,” it’s about whether you’ve got a buddy who would like a sweet-salaried sinecure. They’d rather put a retired cop in a corner office than hire two mechanics to keep the buildings from falling apart.
Couldn’t agree more. Like I said, my time @ DTCC was my only experience working in the public sector. Since the state of DE pays all DTCC salaries, technically they’re all state employees. I’m sure similar situations occur within the state and county ranks.
Word from a usually-reliable source is that SB 50 will be stricken, or at least pulled from the Ready List in the Senate.
Let’s hope so, though I wish there was a scenario where the state tells Brainard his CCIF is a pipe dream that will never come true and he should get on already with managing costs/raising tuition rates.
The thing is, if Brainard is to be believed, a big if in and of itself, this issue of maintenance upkeep has been building for years. And THIS is the only way out that he sees? In other words, don’t do anything to address the issue until the alleged crisis becomes calamitous. Which, BTW, we’re being asked to take his word on. I mean,seriously? As Rufus wrote, “If they legitimately need more $$, put it in the budget request and let the honorables vote it up or down.”
Yep, don’t tax property owners w/o them having ANY say on this money grab by Del-Tech and its Board.
I personally believe we should repeal the County Vo-Tech funding method now in place. Since Vo-Techs presently foster/encourage/practice exclusionary admission practices (like some charters) that negates opportunities for students who are not interested in college but are interested in a trade than they should also have to go out for referendums to be passed by their entire tax base.
Representative John Kowalko
Mr. Kowalko,
I usually agree with you about most everything, but I would respectfully submit that we need to do away with the referendum structure as a whole. School is a legal requirement; maintaining buildings and providing equal funding SHOULD be a requirement to fulfill that requirement, not an optional thing that residents, many of who move here to benefit from our low property taxes and have no kids who suffer, get to vote on.
I get the concern of how the votechs are funded, and they are legitimate concerns, but the real crime is the lack of funding for the districts who are unable to pass needed referendums because their people are so irrationally anti-tax.
I agree we need to do away with the door to door begging we force our public education system to endure via referendum system. Meanwhile make Vo-Techs earn their status as publicly funded schools that do not meet their purposes.
Rep. Kowalko
Long live voter referendums. I’d like to see parents pay more for each child they have in public school.
Sure, as long as they don’t have to pay into your Social Security. Do you work at being a dick or does it come naturally?
Check out this thread on the bill https://twitter.com/MatthewCBittle/status/1098732675194597376
Gotta love Matt Bittle. Great stuff. Good things happen when Nicole Poore doesn’t show up.
I do, however, disagree with him on one point–the issue of when the bill should have been introduced. In the past, this bill’s predecessors have been introduced late in session when proponents hoped they could sneak it through in the waning days.
This time, with new senators who were not familiar with the backstory, Brainard and McDowell introduced it early in the hope, as Matt pointed out, that it could be rushed through before anyone was paying attention.
My take? Since the bill sucks, there’s no perfect time to introduce it.
Here’s my comment that I posted on Facebook yesterday:
With all the drama surrounding SB 50, here are my thoughts.
***DelTech and 19 school districts and 20+ charter schools have serious infrastructure needs that must be addressed.
***These infrastructure needs must be given their due attention, as these buildings belong to Delaware taxpayers and if not given appropriate TLC, then they will become liabilities instead of assets.
***We are going to have to pay for all of this in some way…no amount of griping from members of a particular political persuasion will change that.
***The referendum system for public schools has become a dangerously unreliable way to get needed capital and infrastructure improvements to public schools. It must go.
***The state must immediately produce estimates of infrastructure and capital improvements needed to every single last educational facility in our state.
***The state must finally reassess properties in all three counties. It’s been nearly 50 years since Sussex has been reassessed and it’s been nearly 40 since Kent and New Castle have been reassessed.
***The state must immediately remove language — wherever it is! — that says reassessments must be “revenue neutral.” Screw that. WE NEED REVENUE.
***My argument against SB 50 was never that “DelTech doesn’t need it!” or “DelTech doesn’t deserve it!” or “Mark Brainard makes too much money!” as you will see in the comment thread of certain right-wing Delaware media outlets. On the contrary, I fully agree DelTech needs these capital improvements, but not at the expense of K-12 public education, whose needs have been ignored for DECADES.
I visited nearly 100 schools last year and saw buildings decaying and crumbling. I spoke with educators — particularly in the lower part of the state — who shared with me “Oh, our school board won’t even vote to do a referendum because they are conservative and don’t want taxes raised.” BUT YOUR BUILDINGS ARE FALLING APART!!!! At some point, there will be a reckoning and the bill will come due. It’s already past due in dozens of our schools around the state.
DelTech deserves their facilities improved. But so do the 200+ public K-12 schools up and down the state whose needs are NOT being met by the referendum system that favors more progressive districts and penalizes districts whose constituents have a negative view of taxation.
We need a bill that looks at capital and infrastructure spending in an equitable manner. SB 50, in its current form, does no such thing.
Though I agree with you that DE’s public schools have a serious infrastructure funding problem, DelTech is not simply an extension of our public school system for numerous reasons:
1. Again, grades 1-12 are compulsory, college is not.
2. DelTech has multiple funding sources such as tuition, grants, donations, etc. that the public schools do not.
Yes, referendums are a knife that cuts both ways. However, the argument to do away with them is prefaced on the assumption that school boards are good stewards with the public’s tax money, and sometime’s they’re not (like say, wanting a multi-level parking garage for students @ Newark High?)
Another issue I have with DelTech’s infrastructure plight is that they seem to prioritize expanding and improving facilities over fixing existing problems. It’s like me asking my neighbors to pay for my leaking roof while I spend my money on adding another bedroom on to the back.
I agree with both your number one and two…nothing in my comment says otherwise. In fact, in another Facebook thread from two days ago, I said the difference is that DelTech is non-compulsory, so that should be taken into account.
Many states around the country do not utilize referendum. If we allowed school boards to vote to raise taxes when certificates of need have shown facilities need upgrades, then school board elections would effectively become referenda, which is where we need to go in a state that routinely sees only a few hundred votes in school board elections, while referenda elections in our largest districts often see upwards of 10,000 voters.
Lots going on here, but I definitely agree with what you’re saying here.
This looks like a great first draft of strike demands.
LOL. 😉
The state is awash in money. Our so-called “leaders” are just too chickenshit to go after any of it.
If anyone would look at this long-range, they’d realize investing in bricks and mortar and considering it “education spending” is a fool’s game.
We are rapidly approaching the end of that era. Online education is growing at four-year colleges. Within a decade carbon taxes will make commuting to a central location seem not just expensive but destructive. Given those trends, how wise is it to pump hundreds of millions of dollars into aging structures, which will need a regular infusion as they get older?
With that in mind, consider the bigger funding picture. The state already gives UD $120 million annually. Despite that expenditure, lawmakers have — at the urging of one of their former colleagues, Lonnie George — expanded DelTech to the point where it gets $80 million annually. Much of this is needed because UD, desiring the larger tuition bills it charges out-of-state students, has steered many in-state students into DelTech for their first two years. If more Delawareans were admitted to UD rather than shunted into DelTech, DelTech wouldn’t face the enrollment pressure it currently does. We funded this plan, which expanded DelTech, which now has higher expenses because of this expansion. Yet while UD accepted fewer Delawareans, its taxpayer funding was not diminished.
To put it more simply, taxpayers are footing the bills for a system that seems built to benefit the schools more than the taxpayers and employees. They would mind doing that less if DelTech was run more like an educational institution and less like the political cesspool it is presently, and they might mind it less if UD opened its books (or took the funding cut it should for admitting fewer Delawareans).
All this while DelState, the only state-chartered university, gets $35 million a year.
While SB50 will temporarily be withdrawn as they search for a new fix, we need to encourage our legislators to look deeper into what caused this problem in the first place. How can we help them avoid problems like this and other mismanagement from happening in the future? Here is my take in today’s Delaware State News.
https://delawarestatenews.net/opinion/commentary-sb-50-is-an-unprincipled-slippery-slope/