OT - Another defeat in Indianapolis

[tehmackdaddy]

That doesn't matter Mikie. Didn't you hear. The stadium will increase revenues of the great town of Indianapolis. Thus its totally justified. No need to get into the nitty gritty.

To the contrary, if you got "into the nitty gritty" you would see that your argument doesn't hold any weight.

 

[Steve-o]

I no longer live in Indiana, but the ability to understand the importance of building Lucas Oil stadium still seems to be flying right over the heads of Indiana voters.

http://www.nacwaa.org/rc/rc_articlepr_NCAA_Indianapolis.php

Lucas Stadium will also host the NCAA final four at least once every four years until 2039, with options to extend it to 2069 (imagine it would be in a newer stadium by then).

"Under the terms of the deal, the NCAA also agreed to extend its headquarters lease by 10 years, to 2039, with options to lengthen it to 2069, and to hold its annual convention in Indianapolis every five years..."

"The deal also will allocate to Indianapolis more NCAA tournament games in the first, second, and regional rounds of play. "

The deal stipulated that Indianapolis build a new stadium, and the NCAA deal alone will bring $1 Billion into the city of Indianapolis.

The cost of building the stadium < $1 Billion.

Whether the city kept the Colts or not, the stadium still had to be built. So any revenue from or for the Colts is simply a by-product.

The city is also going to generate tons more revenue by tearing down the dome and expanding the Convention Center.

I guess people want to take Indianapolis back to the way it was in the early 80s? I'm sure dead bodies to float in the canals can be found for cheap to decorate the place.

 

[Major A$$hole*]

What do taxpayers pay? Do you even know the breakdown in percentages of where the funding is coming from? Judging by your comments, no. If you'd take a look at that, you wouldn't call it "highway robbery."

So how is the city/state comming up with the 600 mill for the stadium? Whats the point of your post if you dont explain that?

 

[RoadGrader]

Re: Re: Re: OT - Another defeat in Indianapolis

The county income tax rate was 1%, and Peterson upped that to 1.65% through a city county council vote not too long ago. This is supposed to generate an additonal 90 million per year in taxes, and the money was earmarked for public safety (police, fire etc). The tax is levied against the residents of Marion County.

As for S/M, the money for the new stadium and convention center expansion is being generated via an increase in the sales tax on food and beverages purchased at restaraunts. The increase was 1%, and only affects Marion County and the surrounding (doughnut) counties that voted for it. The doughnut counties were enticed by being able to keep half of the increase for their general fund, and submitting the other half to Marion County to pay for the Stadium/Convention Center expansion.

As far as Former Mayor Peterson receiving any real blowback from the Stadium/Convention center isssue, I find that hard to believe and so do most if not all of the political pundits from print, radio and TV here. You aren't going to find too many people upset that the stadium/cc expansion was funded via an alternative and completely optional tax. The key issues for turning out the Demo Mayor as well as turning the CCC from a 15-14 Demo control to a 17-12 Republican sweep were the following:

1) The State Property Tax Increases. These were ridiculous, and were most insidious to the people living on the North Side of Indy, who are rich and mostly Republican, and saw their property taxes increase 300-400%. That brought them out en masse to vote. And while State Property Tax increases aren't the Mayor's fault, him increasing the County Income tax at nearly the same time put him in the corsshairs of many disgruntled voters. That brought the independant voter, the Reagan Democrats and the po'd Republican vote out.

2) Crime: Violent crime and Property Crime has increased during Peterson's 8 year regin as Mayor, and we have less cops on the steet now than when he took over. He ran in 1999 on putting 400 new Cops on the street with Federal grant money. He did that, but then through not replacing the officer lost via attrition (retirement, leaving the force) and then losing the Federal Grant money, this had a negative net affect on officers on the street. People are leaving Indianapolis City Proper in droves for the suburbs and the bedroom communities in the doughnut counties surrounding Marion County.

3) Apathy/Overconfidence: The Marion County Republican Committee didn't fund Ballards campaign nearly like it should have, because they didn't feel he coul unseat the popular incumbent. He was working with pocket change for his campaign compared to Peterson's warchest. That created an environment where Ballard was able to sneak up on Peterson, and before he knew what hit him, it was too late. He didn't campaign nearly hard enough, because the underestimated their opponent and the anger of the average Hoosier voter.

TYVM for the detailed reply, IU_K.....

I take it the "county income tax" is in lieu of the City of Indianapolis not taxing real property (homes/commercial buildings/rental property/condos,etc) as that appears to be a State of Indiana levy?

(and the now 1.65% county tax is on what specifically?)

does the city get a % kick from the State on RE taxes collected?

my questions do not relate to anything re: Lucas Oil Stadium, BTW.....I was just curious WTF was going on with such steep rises in taxation out there

 

[tehmackdaddy]

So how is the city/state comming up with the 600 mill for the stadium? Whats the point of your post if you dont explain that?

The point of my post is to show that you're commenting on a topic you know very little about.

But since I'm such a nice guy:

Construction of Lucas Oil Stadium and the expansion of the Indiana Convention Center are considered one project, so financing is lumped together. The budget for the stadium is $675 million, and the convention center is expected to cost $275 million, for a total price tag of $950 million. Once financing charges and interest are factored in, however, the cost rises to $1.8 billion. The debt is expected to be paid off in 2040.


Here's a breakdown of where public funds are coming from:

1) 45 percent -- 1 percent increase in the Marion County food and beverage tax.
2) 22 percent -- 3 percent increase in the Marion County hotel tax.
14 percent -- Revenue from the existing professional sports development area tax being diverted to the project.
3) 6 percent -- 1 percent increase in the ticket tax at sporting venues.
4) 6 percent -- 1 percent restaurant tax in six neighboring counties.
5) 5 percent -- 2 percent increase in the Marion County car rental tax.
6) 1 percent -- Revenue from the sale of Colts license plates.

Note: Percentages do not total 100 because of rounding.

Source: Indiana Finance Authority

1) You go out to eat, spend $50, you pay $0.50 (fiddy cent) more
2) Mainly a tax on visitors and businesses
3) $100 ticket now costs $101
4) same as #1
5) same as #2
6) $$$ raised by specialty license plate sales


The OP is misleading as it appears to blame more taxes on the new stadium than is actually the case.

 

[IU_Knightmare]

Re: Re: Re: Re: OT - Another defeat in Indianapolis

TYVM for the detailed reply, IU_K.....

I take it the "county income tax" is in lieu of the City of Indianapolis not taxing real property (homes/commercial buildings/rental property/condos,etc) as that appears to be a State of Indiana levy?

(and the now 1.65% county tax is on what specifically?)

does the city get a % kick from the State on RE taxes collected?

my questions do not relate to anything re: Lucas Oil Stadium, BTW.....I was just curious WTF was going on with such steep rises in taxation out there

The reason for the County Income Tax increase? Who really knows why for sure...if I had to venture a guess, it is primarily due to poor fiscal management by the city/county politicians. Our police and fire pensions have gone unfunded/underfunded for a few decades now, so they keep borrowing from Peter to pay Paul via additional taxes and/or bond issues. That said, the additional income tax increase was said to be for police and fire.

As far as the 1.65% county tax, that is a tax paid by residents of Marion County and taken out of their paychecks along with Fed/State/FICA, or paid directly by those who are self employed.

The Property Tax is actually a State legislated tax but is assessed, collected and administered on a local level. The majority of the Property Tax goes to fund Schools and Public Safety, as other local government functions. Here is an overlay:

http://www.in.gov/dlgf/taxpayer/property_tax_dist.html

We kinda got hit with a double whammy as taxes go. We saw a drastic increase in property taxes along with a hit on the county income tax rate. For the longest time, our tax bills have been calculated at a percentage of the assessed property's value. Unfortunately, the assessed figure was nowhere near the actual or appraised value of the property. Nobody wanted to address the problem that most residential property was well under-assessed, and the Gubernatorial Administrations on both sides of the aisle have kicked this down the road in the past few decades. They enacted a law that called for homes to be re-assessed using a more market-value system, and that caused a huge increase in tax liability for many Hoosiers.

So instead of seeing small and incremental increases every few years over the past few decades and being able to budget accordingly had the properties been properly assessed and revisted every few years, they were hit with 20 years worth all at once. It was sticker shock...and while most people (including myself) know that these folks actually got off easy (basically paying much less in property taxes than they should have for that 20 or so years) the State Legislature and Executive Office have no excuse to not have implemented these increases incrementally.

So that is more or less the "why" of the tax increases.

 

[SteelerFan87]

Here in Pittsburgh when we were planning to build the 2 new stadiums (Heinz Field and PNC Park) with public money, it was put up to a vote, and the people voted it down. The politicians did it anyway. To my knowledge, the Steelers and Pirates haven't lost any fans because of that.
:shrug:
(Well the Pirates have lost fans, but that's because they suck, lol)

 

[LVent*]

Here in Pittsburgh when we were planning to build the 2 new stadiums (Heinz Field and PNC Park) with public money, it was put up to a vote, and the people voted it down. The politicians did it anyway. To my knowledge, the Steelers and Pirates haven't lost any fans because of that.
:shrug:
(Well the Pirates have lost fans, but that's because they suck, lol)

The steelers would of gotten it on their own merit via the public since they have meant alot, where as the pirates as you said just plain blow and arent even trying to improve.

 

[RoadGrader]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: OT - Another defeat in Indianapolis

The reason for the County Income Tax increase? Who really knows why for sure...if I had to venture a guess, it is primarily due to poor fiscal management by the city/county politicians. Our police and fire pensions have gone unfunded/underfunded for a few decades now, so they keep borrowing from Peter to pay Paul via additional taxes and/or bond issues. That said, the additional income tax increase was said to be for police and fire.

As far as the 1.65% county tax, that is a tax paid by residents of Marion County and taken out of their paychecks along with Fed/State/FICA, or paid directly by those who are self employed.

The Property Tax is actually a State legislated tax but is assessed, collected and administered on a local level. The majority of the Property Tax goes to fund Schools and Public Safety, as other local government functions. Here is an overlay:

http://www.in.gov/dlgf/taxpayer/property_tax_dist.html

We kinda got hit with a double whammy as taxes go. We saw a drastic increase in property taxes along with a hit on the county income tax rate. For the longest time, our tax bills have been calculated at a percentage of the assessed property's value. Unfortunately, the assessed figure was nowhere near the actual or appraised value of the property. Nobody wanted to address the problem that most residential property was well under-assessed, and the Gubernatorial Administrations on both sides of the aisle have kicked this down the road in the past few decades. They enacted a law that called for homes to be re-assessed using a more market-value system, and that caused a huge increase in tax liability for many Hoosiers.

So instead of seeing small and incremental increases every few years over the past few decades and being able to budget accordingly had the properties been properly assessed and revisted every few years, they were hit with 20 years worth all at once. It was sticker shock...and while most people (including myself) know that these folks actually got off easy (basically paying much less in property taxes than they should have for that 20 or so years) the State Legislature and Executive Office have no excuse to not have implemented these increases incrementally.

So that is more or less the "why" of the tax increases.

I would be pissed if I were you guys out there and the pols were found to allowed for years of under-assessment of real property to blowback all one one tidal wave like this --- poor planning (they must have been borrowing and/or curtailing services to keep up)

sound like you're heading towards Massachusetts' Standards of Overtaxation, so congrats