Carroll Andrew Morse

Residential Taxation in Rhode Island Municipalities, Part 1

By Carroll Andrew Morse | February 23, 2012 |

Everything up until now has basically been the prologue. Now on to the real thing. Commercial property tax revenue is a relatively small portion of how RI municipalities generate their funds. The major part of the story involves residential tax revenue plus state aid. An important quantity that needs to be taken into consideration, usually…

Commercial Property Levies by Rhode Island Municipality

By Carroll Andrew Morse | February 22, 2012 |

The next local tax table is a little more concrete than the previous two and their somewhat amorphous bases of “valuation” per resident. The table presented here is a list of Rhode Island communities, ranked by the amount of commercial and industrial property tax levy per resident. Again, the amount of “commercial” revenue attributed to…

Commercial Property Assessments by Rhode Island Municipality, Plus PILOT Payments

By Carroll Andrew Morse | February 21, 2012 |

Furthering the discussion from both Justin’s post on Providence and Brown University, and my post from last week on commercial and industrial property values in Rhode Island municipalities, bear in mind that Providence is already receiving state support, nominally related to some of its tax-exempt properties. Providence receives on the order of $20 million per…

In Case You Missed It…

By Carroll Andrew Morse | February 17, 2012 |

The Cranston School Committtee voted not to appeal the banner ruling, 5-2. Mark Schieldrop of the Cranston Patch liveblogged the proceedings. Parker Gavigan of WJAR-TV (NBC 10) is in the middle of a two-part report about Central Falls, which includes this detail to be expounded upon…City records show the chief of staff hired her lawyer’s…

Commercial Property Assessments by Rhode Island Municipality, as a Measure of the Impacts of Tax-Exempts on Providence

By Carroll Andrew Morse | February 15, 2012 |

To what degree is governing the City of Providence hampered by the existence of tax-exempt property within its boundaries? One way to begin answering this question is to start with readily available fiscal-data. Each year, all Rhode Island municipalities report tax assessment and levy information to the Division of Municipal Finance in the state’s Department…

An Open Thread for Interesting Times

By Carroll Andrew Morse | February 14, 2012 |

We’ve hit a bit of lull at Anchor Rising today, for reasons entirely unrelated to a lack of things happening in the world worth blogging about. Here are a few big-picture items on my list to cover, that I am planning to articulate upon over the next few weeks…Local taxation numbers in Rhode Island, and…

Buddy Roemer Qualifies for the RI Primary; RI Primary Field Now Complete

By Carroll Andrew Morse | February 14, 2012 |

According to the RI Secretary of State‘s office, Buddy Roemer has qualified for the April 24 Rhode Island Presidential primary. This should complete the primary field (unless signatures are being counted strictly in the order they came in, and all of the signatures for Mark Callahan were submitted after the other candidates’ were, which is…

Coming up in Committee: Ten Sets of Bills Scheduled to be Heard by the RI General Assembly, February 14 – February 16

By Carroll Andrew Morse | February 13, 2012 |

10. Bud Art. 27: Creates a restricted-receipt account for historic preservation tax-credit processing fees, to be used for reimbursing historic tax-credit processing fees (H Finance; Tue, Feb 14). Ed. note: Rational government budgeting at its finest? 9. H7406, aka the strange regulatory bill of the week: Sets a minimum price of $35.00 for transportation provided…

Robert Flanders’ Answers to Questions on Receivership

By Carroll Andrew Morse | February 10, 2012 |

Central Falls Receiver Robert Flanders certainly cannot be faulted for not responding to inquiries in a timely fashion… Q1: You have been quoted on the Buddy Cianci radio show as saying that some sitting Rhode Island Mayors should approach the state government and ask to become the receivers for their cities. Is this indeed a…

Receivership as a Way for Mayors to Grab Total Control of City Government?

By Carroll Andrew Morse | February 10, 2012 |

Yesterday was the second consecutive day on which Buddy Cianci, during his WPRO (630AM) radio show, referenced an earlier interview with Central Falls Receiver Robert Flanders, where Receiver Flanders had apparently suggested that Rhode Island Mayors could deal with their fiscal problems by approaching the state and having themselves appointed receivers of their own communities.…