So what value does our community put on quality-of-life activities and how much are residents willing to pay for it through taxes? Last week, Steve Sauder commented in his Wednesday Words that taxpayers subsidizing the Emporia Municipal Golf Course with more than $255,000 was quite an expense.
We followed up the question by soliciting reader feedback on The Gazette website and Facebook. The responses from readers didn’t show overwhelming support for that amount of money being spent. In our unscientific online poll, 68 percent of respondents said they preferred spending nothing on the course, and only 15 percent said that the course should be subsidized with less than $50,000 of city money.
Should quality-of-life activities like the golf course and aquatic park be self-sustaining? Every taxpayer hopes so, but the reality is that probably no items like that are. Every entity, however, needs to strive to make that its goal and not just rely on taxpayer money to take care of budget holes.
Although many of the conversations commented on the need for a golf course, what was not discussed was that Emporia has two golf courses. There is the financially struggling Emporia Country Club that is competing against the city-owned course. This raises the question — should the city be in the business of using taxpayer dollars to put a business out of business?
Another quality-of-life activity was raised Monday night at the Emporia Recreation Center meeting as the board held discussions about having artificial turf installed at Soden’s Grove baseball diamond.
In June, the Rec Center received approval from the Emporia school district to levy additional tax money. And now discussions are beginning about what improvements to make with that money.
With artificial turf being talked about, it has residents wondering whether the Rec Commission will take its new tax money and start creating Taj Mahal sports complexes around the city. It also raises the question of why the city supports just baseball fields. There are sports like soccer that stand independently, and residents question whether those facilities should be entitled to city funding.
Our community has high taxes, and, at some point, we will need to look at partnerships and find opportunities to make quality-of-life activities affordable for those paying the bills. In the meantime, it looks as if quality-of-life activities have a blank check, and the organizations just need to fill in the amount they want to spend.
Chris Walker
Editor & Publisher
lowereastside (anonymous) says...
When I lived in a small southeast Kansas town, Humboldt, Kansas, the fraternal organizations ran concession stands at the ball fields and with the money that we fraternal organizations made we rebuilt the ball fields and put up lights, built bathrooms and a larger concession stand area. Who runs concessions at the ball diamonds now and where does the money go from them? If a town of 3600 can do all of that surely Emporia can.
August 18, 2010 at 5:28 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
seriouslyfolks (anonymous) says...
How is it decided which "quality-of-life activities" get public funding and which ones don't? Soccer no. Golf yes. What about other activities like music? Hot-dog eating contests? Chess? Master gardening? I'm personally one that believes that these activities should not be funded by tax dollars(at least not in times like these) but I am curious as to how it is decided which activities get funded and which ones don't. Did the public vote on these decisions?
August 18, 2010 at 6:54 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
methusla (anonymous) says...
I have one question :
Quality of life for whom ?
It would seem, to me, that if the Citys leaders, whom ever they maybe or whomever or however they think of themselves. Would have the common sense and forsight to realize that if they stop spending or planning to spend taxpayer funds on unnecessary or not immediately needed " Things " and concentrated on lowering property taxes or repealing sales tax extensions and thereby making the cost of living more affordable for Emporians, both Emporians who are already established here and those who are looking for a less expensive place to relocate and live, the people of Emporia, just might, possibly, be able to keep enough of " Their " hard earned money to make a " Better Quality of Life " for themselves .
Folks, we all need to face the fact that Emporia has become a very high cost of living community, for its size ! And that is an accomplishment none of us should be proud of or have let happen .
August 18, 2010 at 9:24 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
slimbolen99 (anonymous) says...
Kind of odd that Johnson County taxes (where I live now) are, and have been about 16% less than Lyon County (where I grew up). Who'da thunk it? Yes, we have more people to provide a tax base, but we have more people to support. And look at all the amenities we have in JoCo vs LyCo. Makes you wonder where your LyCo taxes are going!
Source: http://www.ksrevenue.org/pdf/07-09tab...
August 18, 2010 at 9:48 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
methusla (anonymous) says...
slimbolen99
Just an observation. With the tax burden in Johnson County being 16% less than that of Lyon County . Don' t you think that more Johnson Countians are and will be able to support themselves ?
I mean, after all, you/they will have more money left in your/their pockets and bank accounts after paying taxes, etc.
And yes, Emporia and Lyon Count is one of the most heavily taxed Citys and counties for its size .
And Emporia and Lyon County's population is not growing, but decreasing !
August 19, 2010 at 6:32 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )