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Friday, May 11, 2007

A1: "Sales tax growth slows"

I like to see coverage of things like municipal economics, it's important information for making voters smarter. What bugs me is that it usually comes with weird spin, most of it inadvertent, I'm sure, because arcane subjects tend to carry the shorthand thinking their practitioners employ.

The fact here is that sales-tax revenues in Prescott are up by five percent over last year. But the story we get is that sales-tax growth is down by seven percent against last year. So most readers who've suffered the indignity of a public-school math education will walk away with the idea that the City has less money this year. Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Check this out:
"This year is nothing like last year," Norwood said of ongoing budget deliberations. As opposed to last year's 15-percent jump in the total operating budget, Norwood said he expects this year's total to be up by about 10 percent.
Uncareful readers, and there are lots of 'em, will conclude from this that this year's City budget will be five percent smaller than last year's rather than 25% greater than two years ago.

The story here is that the City has been spending like there's no tomorrow, betting on temporary, freakishly high revenue increases. One might expect that a conservative newspaper would respond to that with a little more skepticism and take some pains to clarify the situation.
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1 comment:

  1. leftturnclydeMay 11, 2007 at 11:42 AM

    What bugs me is that it usually comes with weird spin, most of it inadvertent, I'm sure,"
    you are too kind to these people steven ..

    ReplyDelete

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