Manchester Mayor Frank Guinta and the city’s aldermen have passed on to taxpayers a burden they can ill afford this year: a nearly 5 percent tax increase. And they don’t seem to care.
Every year it is the same. In good times — tax increases. In bad times — tax increases. Aldermen always have an excuse. In prosperous years, they say the city has to fund “essential” services. In down years, they say revenues aren’t high enough. No matter what, they raise our taxes.
Aldermen act as if the taxpayers are an endless supply of money. They act as if the people who pay the city’s bills don’t have bills of their own. Even aldermen who know better behave this way.
Republican Mike Garrity explained the declining revenues by pointing out that people aren’t buying things like new cars, which they pay the city to register. “Basically, people aren’t doing anything,” he said. “They’re just saving and putting money toward heating and buying groceries. That’s what I’m doing at this point.”
So when the people are hoarding their money just so they can pay their heating and food bills, the correct response is to . . . raise their taxes?
Garrity knows that people are struggling. All the aldermen know this. His response? “I think it’s something beyond our control, on the revenue side.”
That’s the attitude of the aldermen right there. The budget is simply beyond their control.
Mayor Frank Guinta pushed hard for spending cuts. But advocating isn’t enough. At this point, the mayor needs to get better results. Guinta has helped keep the tax hikes lower than they would have been if aldermen were left to budget by themselves. That is to his credit. But the aldermen have learned to work around his scoldings. He needs to hold them accountable for their indifference to taxpayers.
For their part, taxpayers need to hold the aldermen accountable, too. They can start by voting for the tax and spending cap that will be up for a vote sometime within the next year. Without that cap, this abuse of the people will never end.