Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, June 13, 1995 TAG: 9506130088
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-2 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DAVID REED ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: CHARLOTTESVILLE LENGTH: Short
Collier knows he can't afford the $15,000 initiation fee and the $300 in monthly dues required of Farmington members on what he makes as a landscape maintenance laborer. That's OK by him.
``It's not my type of people,'' he said.
What irks Collier is that Farmington and other exclusive playgrounds of the wealthy can use a loophole in state laws to cut their property tax bills.
``It tees me off,'' Collier said. ``I don't agree with them getting any tax break. The people who belong there are already wealthy.''
Farmington and another members-only club, Glenmore, have asked the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors to allow them to use the little-known provision in the state's land-use law. It allows local governments to tax certain land according to its agricultural production value rather than the price it would fetch from developers on the open market.
Some people see the value of the loophole.
Dr. Austin Sydnor said he and others who own homes near Farmington's sprawling course want the county to approve the tax break to prevent their membership dues from increasing. But he acknowledged the issue has created a ``kind of class conflict. It raises a lot of emotion.''
Kale Barb, the commissioner of revenue in Harrisonburg, favors the break, which saves Spottswood Country Club $21,564 a year in city property taxes. Barb said the course ``adds a ton of value to the land around here.''
Barb is a Spottswood member whose house overlooks the fifth green.
by CNB