THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, November 6, 1994 TAG: 9411040340
SECTION: PORTSMOUTH CURRENTS PAGE: 02 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: Ida Kay's Portsmouth
SOURCE: Ida Kay Jordan
LENGTH: Medium: 71 lines
Approval of a use permit for a new Girls Inc. youth center on a highly visible tract of land on Portsmouth Boulevard once again will allow an agency with heavy support from the United Way of Hampton Roads to take property off the tax books of Portsmouth.
It happened when the United Way agreed to fund a new YMCA, urging the Y board to move from downtown to a valuable piece of Churchland property fronting on High Street, and it happened when Tidewater Child Care needed a new building and chose a site on London Boulevard in Olde Towne.
Now, don't misunderstand, I'm extremely supportive of all three agencies and believe they perform good services in the community. However, I believe the services would be just as valuable if they were performed on sites with less potential for bringing tax dollars into tiny Portsmouth.
One of the speakers for Girls Inc. said at City Council that the United Way was willing to give the agency as much as $400,000 on the condition Girls Inc. find a site the United Way considers suitable. Obviously, if the Portsmouth Boulevard site suits United Way, Girls Inc. plans to bring youngsters to the center from cities other than Portsmouth. That minimizes the benefits to Portsmouth youth that were so highly touted in the argument for the use permit.
Girls Inc. has been operating in a building owned by the public schools and already off the tax books. Why couldn't the agency build its youth center on that site or a similar site already off the tax books? Or why couldn't it find a tract of land with less potential than the Portsmouth Boulevard site?
Although the chosen site still is zoned residential, there's no doubt that sooner or later it could become a choice office or retail location, producing more, not less, taxes for the city.
Councilman Cameron Pitts said the use of the site for the non-profit agency could cost the city as much as $250,000 in taxes over 10 years. In addition, the city will have to spend $5,000 or more immediately to install a left turn lane for the center and perhaps more thousands for a traffic signal.
Normally, a developer would be required to pay for the costs of a turn lane or a traffic light. However, efforts on the part of some council members to require Girls Inc. to pay for these costs were turned back by a majority of council.
In recent months, the council generally has taken a stand against allowing non-profit agencies to occupy commercial property. It has turned down several requests from churches. HER (Help and Emergency Response) Inc. offered to pay taxes on a piece of residential land in its request for a use permit for a new shelter.
Now, the council has reversed itself. Presumably, those who have been turned down will come back and get their zoning and use permits and we will continue to lose taxes.
HER Inc. did the right thing by offering to pay taxes. Other organizations, including churches, could at least offer payments in lieu of taxes to help defray the city's costs involved in serving any piece of land in the city.
Those who argue that these parcels of land are nothing compared to what the federal and state government owns ``off the books'' have a point.
However, for Portsmouth taxpayers, the little bits add up.
One cent of real estate taxes now brings in about $250,000. Every $250,000 not collected because a piece of property is taken off the tax books by a non-profit organization sooner or later will add 1 cent to the tax rate.
The public must take a stand backing City Council if it rules against churches, the United Way and the boards of various agencies.
Nobody wants taxes to go up, but they will if we don't stop permitting non-profit agencies the use of valuable land unless they agree to payments in lieu of taxes. by CNB