Property Tax: Finney County vs. Ford County, Finney Wins

[Value Pack]

So we all understand what this means.

Make believe you are the person in charge of making a decision as to where to build the next Sam's Club. You can build in Garden City or Dodge City. Both towns would love to have you.

Once built the property taxes will be $54,533.00 per year in Garden City on the building.

Once built the property taxes will be 72% higher in Dodge City or $93,797.00 per year for the same store.

In 10 years Sams/Wal-Mart will pay out $392,640.00 more if located in Dodge City just in property taxes on the building.

Where do you decide to build your new store complex?

[JohnWayne]

Concerning the math calculations, there are several ways to look at the problem. If Finney County is the base, then Finney County is 100% and 100% equals $419.00.

So take the Ford County tax bill of $722.04 and substract the $419 which equals $303.04. Now $303.04 is what percent of the 100%($419.00). Find this by dividing $303.04 by $419.00 and the answer is 0.72(or 72%)

Another way to do this is take $722.04(which at the moment is some unknown percent of the base, 100% or $419.00) and divide it by $419.00 and the answer is 1.72(172%). Now you can substract the base of 100% from the 172% to arrive at 72% higher.

Now if you change the way you look at the situation and want to find out what percentage Finney County is less than Ford County you will find the numbers to be different. In this case Ford County is 100% and that equates to $722.04. To find what percent Finney County is of Ford County(100% base), divide $419 by $722.04 to get 0.5803(58.03%). Therefore, Finney County is 41.97% less than Ford County(100% less 58.03%). This can be checked by taking $722.04 times .4197(41.97%) and the answer is $303.04, which is the correct amount that Finney County is less than Ford County.

Bottom line, anyway you figure it, it costs less to live in Finney County. Plus the shopping is better, contrary to what our civic leaders would like us to believe.

The Duke

[Army_Strong]

Bottom line is Ford County cost more and has less to offer!!!

[Bubba]

Originally Posted by JohnWayne

Concerning the math calculations, there are several ways to look at the problem. If Finney County is the base, then Finney County is 100% and 100% equals $419.00.

So take the Ford County tax bill of $722.04 and substract the $419 which equals $303.04. Now $303.04 is what percent of the 100%($419.00). Find this by dividing $303.04 by $419.00 and the answer is 0.72(or 72%)

Another way to do this is take $722.04(which at the moment is some unknown percent of the base, 100% or $419.00) and divide it by $419.00 and the answer is 1.72(172%). Now you can substract the base of 100% from the 172% to arrive at 72% higher.

Now if you change the way you look at the situation and want to find out what percentage Finney County is less than Ford County you will find the numbers to be different. In this case Ford County is 100% and that equates to $722.04. To find what percent Finney County is of Ford County(100% base), divide $419 by $722.04 to get 0.5803(58.03%). Therefore, Finney County is 41.97% less than Ford County(100% less 58.03%). This can be checked by taking $722.04 times .4197(41.97%) and the answer is $303.04, which is the correct amount that Finney County is less than Ford County.

Bottom line, anyway you figure it, it costs less to live in Finney County. Plus the shopping is better, contrary to what our civic leaders would like us to believe.

The Duke

Thank you! Finally somebody that explained it in a way that makes sense, instead of using disparaging comments and heavy sarcasm.

[pootsy]

Who cares it is higher and we all know it!!!

[banyon]

I haven't been here long, so I don't really know the score. I was all ready to be a contratian on this topic, but after looking at the numbers, I don't think I can.

Here are a couple of interesting links from 2006 U.S. Census Data for the two counties:

Ford

Ford County QuickFacts from the US Census Bureau

Finney

Finney County QuickFacts from the US Census Bureau

This appears to explain why Finney could raise more income with a lower property tax rate:

Ford
Population, 2006 estimate 33,783
Housing units, 2006 12,013
Median value of owner-occupied housing units, 2000 $69,200

Finney
Population, 2006 estimate 39,097
Housing units, 2006 13,945
Median value of owner-occupied housing units, 2000 $83,800
$14k per house + 2k extra houses, little extra infrastructure since populations are similarly sized.

I don't know where to get numbers for cars from, but they might be similar.

[Value Pack]

This appears to explain why Finney could raise more income with a lower property tax rate:

That logic seems incorrect. Using such reasoning would mean that Gray County, which lies between Ford and Finney County should be higher then Ford as they have a smaller population.

Personally I believe that the problem lies with City and County Commissioners that can't see the writing on the wall and that don't know how to say NO to everyone with their hand out. It they ran their businesses like they run the CITY/County, they would quickly be out of business.

We can't continue to spend money like there is no tomorrow. Our school system, our County and our City governments are working 24/7 on ways to spend more money. Our school system may be the worse culprit of all.

Look at Boothill. This is now a black hole for money. If this was a restaurant what would you do if your walk-ins dropped from 300 a day (Boothill 300,000 @ yr) to 60 (60,000) people a day. You reduce the amount of employees and get a smaller building with less overhead if you can't expect 300 people per day anymore. You adapt or you go out of business. What we are doing instead is taking a $10.00 meal and trying to double/triple the price to make up for the lack of people. So what happens, the people eat somewhere else.

I have seen my property tax go up over 100% from what it was in 1995. Where does this stop? When are we as the citizens of Ford County going to say "Enough is enough" and elect people that know that this is a road we have got to get off.

Its no wonder that new business is not coming to Ford County. They can do the numbers and realize that the overhead is too high. So what do we do, we look to the "sin" businesses to bail us out.

I don't gamble, but make no mistake I hope that this will help us bringing people to Dodge that do, but gambling is not a virtue. With gambling, Dodge City can expect to also receive at least three other additional non virtues. Crime, prostitution and more drug use. All of these will increase many times over. To say that is not going to happen is to ignore history.

Math does not lie, neither does history. We are in deep do-do. We have a few people who are yelling at the top of their lungs (like Old Timer) and we are doing nothing about it.

[banyon]

Originally Posted by Value Pack

That logic seems incorrect. Using such reasoning would mean that Gray County, which lies between Ford and Finney County should be higher then Ford as they have a smaller population.

Gray County is disanalogous I think, as they do not have a comparable infrastructure to maintain. Still, if you have numbers, I'd look.

Originally Posted by Value Pack

Personally I believe that the problem lies with City and County Commissioners that can't see the writing on the wall and that don't know how to say NO to everyone with their hand out. It they ran their businesses like they run the CITY/County, they would quickly be out of business.

We can't continue to spend money like there is no tomorrow. Our school system, our County and our City governments are working 24/7 on ways to spend more money. Our school system may be the worse culprit of all.

Look at Boothill. This is now a black hole for money. If this was a restaurant what would you do if your walk-ins dropped from 300 a day (Boothill 300,000 @ yr) to 60 (60,000) people a day. You reduce the amount of employees and get a smaller building with less overhead if you can't expect 300 people per day anymore. You adapt or you go out of business. What we are doing instead is taking a $10.00 meal and trying to double/triple the price to make up for the lack of people. So what happens, the people eat somewhere else.

I don't necessarily disagree with the Boot Hill stance, it does seem wasteful.

Originally Posted by Value Pack

I have seen my property tax go up over 100% from what it was in 1995. Where does this stop? When are we as the citizens of Ford County going to say "Enough is enough" and elect people that know that this is a road we have got to get off.

What has happened to your property value since 1995? Just my guess, but I bet it is also up by around 100%.

Originally Posted by Value Pack

Its no wonder that new business is not coming to Ford County. They can do the numbers and realize that the overhead is too high. So what do we do, we look to the "sin" businesses to bail us out.

I don't gamble, but make no mistake I hope that this will help us bringing people to Dodge that do, but gambling is not a virtue. With gambling, Dodge City can expect to also receive at least three other additional non virtues.Crime, prostitution and more drug use. All of these will increase many times over. To say that is not going to happen is to ignore history.

Casinos often do come with those secondary community effects. Unfortunately, this sort of solution is often what's proposed when counties and school districts are repeatedly asked to slash their budgets until there's little choice. I suspect the abundance of illegals here doesn't help the problem as they likely pay little in property taxes, but probably consume a disproportionate amount of county services. Sending money back to Mexico also means less will go to sales taxes as well.

Originally Posted by Value Pack

Math does not lie, neither does history. We are in deep do-do. We have a few people who are yelling at the top of their lungs (like Old Timer) and we are doing nothing about it.

I'd like to see our budget side by side with Finney's to know what it is we're spending on that they're not. My first point though, that a lower pct of higher property values will yield a similar revenue base to a higher pct of lower property values though also seems to still be axiomatically correct.

[Army_of_One]

Originally Posted by Army_Strong

Bottom line is Ford County cost more and has less to offer!!!

But we have.....


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