I'm taking a course this summer, Internet GIS, where I've been learning all about how to create and publish online, interactive mapping applications. So I created a very ameteur map program which allows you to explore one of the peculiarities of the St. Louis urban structure. You can view it online here:
(Use the little "i" circle thingy and click on any city for more info.)
This shows the municipal property tax rates for each of the 91 municipalities in St. Louis county. Property taxes are based on many different taxing districts, each with it's own rate. Some include the entire metro area, such as the museum/zoo fund, and then there are school districts, sewer districts, library districts, and municipalities.
The interesting thing here (to me at least) is that the richest municipalities with the highest property values pay the least in municipal taxes. Ladue, Town and Country, and Wildwood all pay zero in local property taxes. The reason is that the residents in these areas have enough money that the local governments get by with other revenue sources, such as personal property or sales tax. Also, these high-income areas don't have to provide nearly as many services as most local governments. After all, if everyone lives on a three-acre wooded lot, do you really need to build parks? And these areas also tend to be less densly populated, so there are not many people to provide services too.
One of the central tenets of democratic governance is the free provision of public goods, that is certain things (schools, trash pickup, police, parks) are difficult to provide privately so government taxes the population (and usually high-income at a higher rate) to provide these services to all citizens. But the political fragmentation allows these richer municipalities to wall themselves off from the rest of the metro area, while enjoying all of the amenities of the region. Not only are the richer municipalities not paying the same rate, in many cases they are not paying any local property taxes, while lower-income municipalities have to charge high tax rates because their property values are lower.
This is fairly simplistic view, since as said before, if you own an expensive house, you are paying property taxes, and probably alot, since there are many other taxing districts. But this kind of political fragmentation encourages local governments to compete against each other for tax revenue and discourages regional cooperation.
Anway, that's my project.
If you are interested in a more thourough discussion on contemporary urban structure (and I know you are), check out the following.
Urban Review STL Blog
East-West Gateway Maps
Fragmented By Design: Why St. Louis Has So Many Governments
1 comment:
You are so smart, babe! You should probably write an urban design book very soon.
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