Truth Watch Returns!
BY TRUTH WATCH
Hello
readers. Some of you may remember me. I used to write a column for the Raytown
Report named “Truth Watch”.
Last week I saw a post by Raytown’s very own Ward 3 Alderman, Ryan Myers. He was responding to other posts that were published on Raytown Unleashed. The author of one of those posts said Walmart does not pay any taxes in Raytown. Thank goodness Ryan saw the post and corrected the writer!
Alderman Myers wrote, “Walmart paid nearly half a million dollars in property tax for 2023. That figure does not include the personal property tax paid.”
I wondered if Ryan was being totally honest with his explanation. The part I found baffling was why didn’t he publish the figure Walmart paid in property taxes?
The fact that he did not use whole numbers but prefaced his dollar amount on property tax as “nearly half a million dollars” makes me wonder, “Why the parsing of words on the amount he wrote of as a fact?
Ryan also left out that Walmart does not pay ANY personal property tax on the merchandise on its shelves.
That is because Walmart does not own the “merchandise” on their store shelves.
The retail items on the shelves at a Walmart are not owned by Walmart. Therefore Walmart is not responsible for “personal property tax” on those items.
Which means Walmart pays very little (if any) Business Personal Property Tax on the retail items on their shelves for the public to purchase. Hope this information clears up the question.
Alderman Myers should be more generous in his explanations. Terms like “somewhere around half a million dollars” is pure conjecture. Indicating the retail giant pays Business Personal Property Tax when, in fact, they do not, is clearly misleading, if not dishonest.
It is also important to remember that Walmart is located where it is because of a Taxpayer paid TIF (Tax Increment Financing). This TIF requires sales tax revenue collected by the retail giant be paid by shoppers when they make their purchases. The sales tax from those purchases is then used to pay the debt to create the shopping center in which they are shopping.
USE THIS LINK TO Comment AND VIEW COMMENTS
Why Not Raytown?
 |
| BY GREG WALTERS |
We regularly receive complaints from Raytown homeowners about the outrageous amount of expired temporary tags being used by automobile owners in Raytown.
That's not to say all of those cars are owned in Raytown. After all, our city is only two miles wide. But it does show the need for Raytown to join in the effort in correcting the problem.
Raytown should join Kansas City and Independence in a unified front of enforcement to make sure everyone is paying their fair share of tax dollars. To ignore the problem would be counterproductive to solid governmental practices.
Up until this point only two cities in the metropolitan area (on the Missouri side) have ramped up enforcement on scofflaws who believe they do not have to pay their fair share in taxes.
Both Kansas City and Gladstone have discovered an increase in the number of outstanding warrants they have been able to enforce through the traffic stops. This bonanza of revenue could be earmarked for Raytown's most pressing problem - the repair and upkeep of our neighborhood streets.
For Immediate Release
FROM THE INDEPENDENCE MISSOURI POLICE DEPARTMENT
Due to the large number of expired tags and license plates, the Independence Police Department will begin a zero tolerance enforcement campaign during the last week in February.
We encourage everyone to help do their part and get their vehicle license current and valid insurance before that time. Expired temp tags and license plates are one of the most common complaints we hear from citizens.
USE THIS LINK TO Comment AND VIEW COMMENTS
No comments:
Post a Comment