I hope you can all read the chart on the left. It's the one from last night's Gazette showing the total impact on a $100,000 residence of the Lake Leota dredging project over twenty years of the bond.
Now, I know that not very many folks live in that mythical $100,000 house. So let's double the impact, because I think most of us live in a house that's paying taxes on something under $200,000.
In the first year the impact would be $100 or $8.25 per month or $2.07 per week. Something less than 30 cents a day at any rate. But looking at the way the bond is structured, that impact will fall a little each year so that over the 7300 days of the bond the total impact to our mythical $200,000 house would be less than a quarter a day.
Lake Leota is what it is, a scenic millpond in a relatively small city. But it has been the center of civic activity in this city for very nearly 175 years now. It has been the center of controversy before and, most likely, will be again some day. It's just that in a time when our city is struggling to maintain its identity, to be something more than a bedroom for Madison or a feeder for Janesville's industry, we need to hang on to what we have and to make it shine.
I had my wedding in Leonard/Leota Park with the lake as a backdrop. So did my daughter and I know that we weren't the only ones who have done so. The park and its pond have been civic and social gathering places for decades. We shouldn't pass that up for a quarter a day.
2 comments:
We will be voting no. As are most people I have talked with. I have ran in to a couple who want the lake at the price tag of 2.65 million. I think you are assuming the city is going to be able to pull off the 20 year loan, I have serious doubts of them being able to do that with the economy the way it is. If it goes to 10 years, hang on to your wallets. This is foolish spending at a time of economic crisis and we are not going to indulge them. If they want this so badly let them do more serious fund raising. Which they are yet to do.
I also want to add it is not the heart and soul as I read. Please. It has become a burdensome nuisance. That will continue to cost tax payers for years to come.
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