Citizens should make decision on freeze proposal
We've all heard and read arguments for and against Mayor Teresa Tomlinson's plan for phasing out the Columbus property tax assessment freeze.
What we haven't heard is a convincing argument for why Columbus voters shouldn't be allowed to make that decision.
What we've heard recently is that some members of Columbus Council haven't yet made up their minds.
About what?
The freeze has been a contentious and controversial issue for the more than three decades it's been in effect. Letting the voters reassess it now shouldn't be.
That it was challenged and upheld by voters 24 years ago, or that it was ruled constitutional in federal court a dozen years ago, aren't relevant here. The 1991 vote was about just ending the freeze -- simply repealing the law that created it -- and the court decision was about its legality. This involves neither. Nor does it involve a special election at taxpayer expense, but a single question on the November general election ballot next year.
Whether one is a homeowner or not, a community's tax formula affects every resident. A decision on whether to replace the freeze with a different property tax system might or might not be a close call for Columbus voters. A decision by council on whether to let those voters make that call ought to be easy.
Hooch helpers
This year's annual fall Help the Hooch cleanup project collected less debris and hazardous waste from the Chattahoochee and its banks and tributaries than it has in past years.
And that's a very good thing.
It doesn't mean the effectiveness, and certainly not the enthusiasm, of this annual environmental event -- the largest of its kind in the state -- is waning. Quite the opposite: It means it's working.
"Each year we've had less and less trash we've collected," said Bryan Victor of the Environmental Management Division at Fort Benning. "More and more people are participating, but we've collected less trash because people are getting the word that if you don't put the trash out, you don't have to clean it back up."
Sponsored by Georgia Rivers Alive and Keep Columbus Beautiful, volunteers for Help the Hooch this year brought more than 100,000 pounds of hazardous refuse -- cleaning materials, pesticides and herbicides, batteries, paint and other chemical pollutants -- to the old recycling center on Victory Drive.
More than 9,000 people, young, old and every age in between, gave of their time and efforts to clean up 22 different watershed sites littered with various toxins and plain old trash.
This event just seems to keep getting better. Not by coincidence, so does the river.
This story was originally published October 5, 2015 at 4:52 PM with the headline "Citizens should make decision on freeze proposal."