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Go after wind turbines for taxes
Credit: Daily American, www.dailyamerican.com 9 November 2011 ~~
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Translate: FROM English | TO English
Shade school district is in dire need of revenue. Last week its attempt to increase assessments on properties with coal in the ground was shot down.
Might I suggest that the taxpayers of Shade Township would be better served if the district spent it’s money lobbying Harrisburg to change the law that exempts wind turbines from paying school tax. That’s right – under current law passed by the Rendell administration, wind turbines, which are the most expensive real property in the township, are totally exempt from paying any property taxes – they pay ZILCH. Some make pathetically low “voluntary payments” to districts that equal a tiny fraction of what they would pay if subject to real estate tax laws.
What do you pay on your home, business or land? What would a $3.5 million wind turbine pay if properly subject to property tax laws like every other piece of real estate in Shade Township? This would instantly solve all revenue issues.
Wind turbines are funded by public tax money. Up to 70 percent of their cost is paid for by taxpayers. They produce small amounts of intermittent electricity and almost none on the hottest summer days when power demand is at its highest. Turbines in Somerset County operate at only around 25 percent of their capacity. Electricity that is produced by turbines is three times more expensive than coal, gas or nuke produced electricity. Electric companies are forced by law to buy wind electricity at these ridiculously high rates which they pass on to consumers.
Bottom line is that wind has had a free ride for way too long. It is time for Pa. school districts like Shade to go after these wind companies instead of trying to bleed more cash out of widows and orphans, retired people on fixed incomes and those who are creating jobs.
Jack Buchan
Shaffer Mounatin property owner
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