Daily Archives: 5 November 2014

Local Election Issue: Jail Tax

05 Wednesday Nov 2014

Posted by in az

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In yesterday’s election a question on the ballots in Yavapai county was about increasing an existing sales tax which is used for jail related expenses. In Arizona our politicians create convenient  fictions called “special tax districts” which then levy taxes of some sort. In rare cases this makes sense, say homeowners in a small region want to replace their septic tanks with a sewer plant so they vote to create a sewer district to tax themselves to build and operate the plant. When these special districts cover entire cities or in the case of the jail district an entire county, the district becomes a ruse to deflect accountability. So the county Board of Supervisors did not raise taxes for the jail, the jail district board did it. They did it, not us. Even though these are the same people and the geographical area is identical. Do other states do this? I can’t say.

Anyway, this election cycle had a jail sales tax increase for the jail district a.k.a. for Yavapai County to build a new jail in Prescott. At this moment the results are 31,692 in favor vs. 34,386 opposed. Very close, I don’t know if this is the final results or not. It’s a good example of one’s vote actually mattering in an election.

At the same time our political masters want to build a new jail, the local school board (Prescott Unified School District) wants to close 2 schools due to declining enrollment. Let’s see if I am getting this right, build a jail and close 2 schools. Hmmm …

Perhaps this answers a riddle. About a year or two ago they built a large steel fence around the Prescott High School and I was wondering “for what?”. Was this done to facilitate converting this campus into yet another jail? If we have enough jails then maybe we don’t need any schools. Hmmm …