Date: Fri, 10 Feb 2012 22:34:19 -0500
From: chathammatters
Subject: Response to Steve Cote, co-owner of the City Tap
Steve Cote, co-owner of the City Tap in Pittsboro wrote a letter to the editor in this week’s Chatham News/Record, opposing granting the Haw River Christian Academy the approval they need to locate in town as proposed.
Steve Cote puts forward some puzzling arguments (quoting from the newspaper):
“The HRCA pays no taxes, generates no sales taxes, and are largely shuttered at night. This does nothing for the town and hurts all of us who are working to build a downtown that attracts people, creates jobs and provide a stream of tax dollars to Pittsboro. In this manner, approving the building’s special use permit devalues commercial properties in downtown.”
Let’s take this gem one piece at a time:
1) “The HRCA pays no taxes”
– The HRCA pays salaries, benefits, and taxes for its teachers, its administrators, its custodians. It also pays rent which covers the property taxes paid by the owner of the property.
– Every parent, teacher, and other school personnel who will shop downtown will pay sales taxes… if this school goes in.
– On the other hand the long empty building does not pay any of these taxes or salaries or benefits… but the property owner has to foot the bill for the property tax (ouch).
2) “generates no sales taxes,”
– This is a demonstrably poor location for retail (I refer you to the building’s history with retail), if not this school, and not retail, then what would be viable? The obvious answer is a services business which of course pays No sales taxes, assuming you could attract one to the building and to this area in the first place.
– Again the parents, teachers, and staff who otherwise would not come into town every day will pay sales taxes.
3) “and are largely shuttered at night.”
Yes… so would any Retail store… what is your point?
What are you looking for?, some sort of business that opens at night and sends customers to your bar? What sort of business would that be…?
4) “This does nothing for the town and hurts all of us who are working to build a downtown that attracts people…”
Really?
– Bringing in the parents of 100 or so students twice every day with the opportunity to get a coffee, or grocery shop, or buy clothes, or get a tire changed, or do their banking, or get a hair cut, or… well the list goes on and on. The same goes for the teachers, and the administrative and other staff who work for the school.
– But… having them come into town every day does nothing to attract people…?
5) “…approving the building’s special use permit devalues commercial properties in downtown”
– I see, an empty building sitting empty for years doesn’t devalue commercial properties downtown, but a renovated building which daily brings in parents, teachers and staff… you say devalues property downtown?
– Huh? What? How?
Steve, I appreciate that you have a very unusual perspective, that’s fine… but there are many many businesses downtown who desperately need to attract more people downtown, for them this opportunity is a real boon, bringing that many people in town each and every day that would otherwise come in one in a blue moon if that.
Again, according to the Director of the NC Main Street Program the 3 highest priorities of downtown revitalization are:
#1 increasing traffic
#2 filling vacant buildings
#3 improving the appearance of buildings
This school appears to fit the bill in every respect.
The commissioners have clearly taken your perspective into account, I also hope they use an appropriate grain of salt when doing so..