O P I N I O N
THE SOAPBOX
Stand up. Speak up. It’s your turn.
Manchester has been led by people for decades who do not care that spending more money on buses would increase the value of business properties which would increase the tax revenues from business properties.
Cut a million from budget from Manchester Transit Authority and expect sales of downtown businesses and businesses in other parts of Manchester to decrease by millions. If people are not able to find parking spaces and are not able to use buses, sales of businesses decline. The less money people have to spend on cars the more money people have to spend in restaurants, stores.
Reducing spending on buses may increase the numbers of injuries and deaths from car accidents.
Please find out if donations by businesses to schools, Manchester Transit Authority, and high school sports teams are tax deductible.
Does any elected officials in Manchester care that we spend more than $4 million a year in rooms and meals tax revenues for SNHU Arena and yet we still do not have ticket surcharge on tickets? Final cost for arena will likely be over $100 million dollars.
Small business owners are complaining about parking spaces and elected officials want to reduce spending on Manchester Transit Authority making it harder for them to stay in business, which may lead to Manchester taking in many millions of dollars less in property taxes. The easier it is for people to shop at businesses the more their profits go up and the more valuable business properties become. Have our elected officials ever been to Boston and looked up? Would our elected officials like our airport which is NOT in MA to be more successful?
The less money Manchester city government spends on Manchester Transit Authority buses the less the federal government spends.
The more money Manchester city government spends on Manchester Transit buses the more the federal government will spend.
Do people who hold elective office in Manchester want to increase the profits of businesses and increase the business property tax base of Manchester?
There needs to be a city charter change so that people have the power to fire the Mayor, Aldermen, School Board members whenever they want.
The economic multiplier of buses may be more than 1,000 times. Spend $4 million a year and get more than $4 billion in property taxes over time as well as more money from rooms and meals tax and business profits tax for the state. Property tax base of Manchester could be $4 billion greater.
More luxury apartments get built in buildings as tall as Boston has the better able Manchester will be to fund schools. Parking garages may be built far away from them possibly in other cities connected by buses and 24 hour a day, seven days a week shuttles.
One of the main reasons people come to NH is to have local control and not tyranny by one of three worst State legislatures in the country.
Manchester should get to decide how to spend its local property taxes.
At least seventy percent of the money that Manchester takes in from state rooms and meals tax and at least 70 percent of money that Manchester takes in from state business profits tax should go to Manchester.
Manchester city government, Manchester’s parents, Manchester’s students should decide how schools are run in Manchester and not state government.
I would like to know when Manchester will have a voluntary ticket surcharge on tickets sold at SNHU Arena and baseball stadium. If the Republican Party had not betrayed the taxpayers of Manchester by being opponents of a mandatory ticket surcharge at arena owned by the people of Manchester many millions of dollars would have been raised so far from mandatory ticket surcharge at SNHU Arena which will likely cost us well over $100 million.
Republican Party has chosen to betray taxpayers for many years. When Joyce Craig first ran for Mayor, Republican Party sent out mailings attacking her for supporting ticket surcharge at arena and baseball stadium. They did not mention they are owned by taxpayers, how much they have cost so far, and how much more they will cost.
I believe city government before people got to vote on arena promised us there would be a ticket surcharge on tickets at arena to reduce harm to taxpayers.
Kenneth Scot Stremsky lives in Manchester.
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