This October, Haines voters will be asked to vote on whether the $150,000 senior and disabled veteran propety tax exemption should be increased to $300,000. Tryg Bakke spoke with residents about the ballot question.
Seniors over the age of 65 and Disabled Veterans in Alaska can qualify for a tax exemption that would lower the property tax on their homes.
Jila Stuart is the finance director for the Haines Borough, and says the state of Alaska will exempt the first $150,000 of value for a primary residence for a qualifying senior or disabled veteran, and since it’s a state mandate, the Haines Borough has to honor that.
Stuart estimates that if the $300,000 exemption were in place last fiscal year, the brough would have received roughly $719,000 in property tax revenue, which is about 18% of total property tax revenue.
“A couple people have asked about the numbers, and we ran numbers just for this year, like if this extra $150,000 of exemption was in place this year, it would have cost the borough about $296,000 so that’s a pretty big gap,” Stuart said.
Leigh Horner, a supporter of the increase, petitioned to have the question on October’s ballot.
“I investigated how to go about getting this put onto the ballot, and I started getting signatures to increase the tax exemption for seniors and disabled veterans to $300,000 now there are other municipalities in the state of Alaska who’ve already done this,” Horner said. “Skagway is one of them. So this is not new. This is not isolated to Haines.”
Horner said she thinks that without this raise, some seniors risk losing their homes.
“Seniors live on a fixed income, and their income is not increasing, and they are becoming more and more nervous about how they are going to find the money to pay for these property taxes,” Horner said. “So if we increase the tax exemption, it will make life a little easier for those people. It costs a lot to live in Haines, as the seniors are finding out. Have you been to the grocery store lately? And their wages aren’t getting any higher, and some are facing the fact of having to sell their home there.
But not everyone agrees. Haines resident, Nelle Jurgelite-Green, thinks the $150,000 exemption is fine as is. She said she’s concerned that the loss of revenue would impact borough infrastructure such as road maintenance, the public safety building and other facilities like the library and school. She said she’d like to see a needs-based exemption.
“But as it stands now, with just the question on the ballot, let’s increase it to this amount, whatever that amount is, I’m not for it,” Jurgeleit-Greene said. “I think there’s always a place for need based situations. I don’t care if it’s property taxes, whether it’s being able to buy food or your utilities, I think there should be some need based cases heard and made available to those who really need them. It’s gotten tough to live here in this town and everywhere, costs are up. So yes, I am absolutely for any need based opportunities that could come out of this.”
Haines Mayor Tom Morphet says that he thinks a better solution than increasing the property tax exemption would be to expand the borough’s hardship exemption, which he says will target the population Horner’s proposal seeks to help.
“We can increase that so low income people who maybe only have it, say you have a $200,000 house, $250,000 house,” Morphet said. “If your income is a certain level, you would get an additional exemption, an additional to the $150,000, we can make that change.”
This exemption involves a little bit of math, and it’s, I think, you know, I’m encouraging people to support this, I think, more precise tool for giving an additional exemption for folks who are low to moderate incomed.
The decision to raise the exemption from $150,000 to $300,000 will be on this year’s ballot for the Haines Borough election. Voting will be held on Oct. 1.
