As Guilford County property owners brace for potentially higher tax bills following the latest countywide revaluation, most of the public conversation has been focused on one question: How much of that increased tax base value will local governments actually nab and spend?
However, while that debate has taken center stage, a second, much less discussed story has been unfolding at the same time – the projects on the table that will mean local government spending for decades to come.
Inside both Greensboro and Guilford County government, officials are steadily committing to a series of very large, long-term capital projects that, taken together, represent a financial footprint far larger than any single vote or ordinance suggests.
Individually, each project appears routine: A water treatment upgrade here; a transmission line there; lots of expensive school projects.
Oh, and a big upgrade for county facilities.
Viewed as a whole, the picture changes.
The City of Greensboro – through its water resources system – is in the middle of planning and funding multiple major upgrades tied to drinking water treatment, regulatory compliance and system reliability. Those include advanced treatment improvements at the Mitchell Water Treatment Plant aimed at addressing emerging contaminants, along with additional work at the Lake Townsend Water Treatment Plant and related infrastructure.
In addition, Greensboro is moving forward with new finished-water transmission mains and system connections designed to strengthen the overall network. These aren’t small projects. They’re multi-phase efforts that will unfold over years – with funding coming in stages through ordinances, contracts and financing approvals.
At the county level, the scope is even broader.
The Guilford County Board of Commissioners is overseeing a voter-approved school bond program totaling roughly $2 billion, intended to address aging school facilities across the county. That program alone will be implemented in phases over many years, with bonds issued incrementally and construction schedules stretching a long time into the future.
At the same time, Guilford County leaders have been discussing plans for tearing down the county-owned Truist building and building a new government campus, a project that could involve hundreds of millions more in county borrowing.
Each project has been presented in public meetings. But they’re typically considered one at a time, often separated by months or even years, and rarely discussed as part of a combined financial picture.
That creates a situation where the magnitude of the projects taken together can me misunderstood.
A single ordinance might authorize a few million dollars for design work or a contract. A later action adds construction funding. Then another amendment increases the total again. Each step is presented accurately and is publicly approved; however, the cumulative scale can be difficult for residents to track without stepping back and connecting the dots.
The Rhino Times doesn’t like to use the analogy of slowly raising the heat and boiling a frog to death – partly because it’s used so often and partly because it’s scientifically inaccurate (the frog will in fact try to escape) – however when it comes to major projects and taxpayer money the analogy, flawed though it is, seems highly apropos.
These long-term commitments are being made just as property values across Guilford County have increased significantly in the latest revaluation. That revaluation will play a central role in upcoming budget decisions, including whether local governments adopt revenue-neutral tax rates or opt to bring in additional revenue. There has been a lot of citizen outcry but at the same time, area leaders have a whole lot of new projects to pay for.
Simultaneously, the city’s water system operates as an enterprise fund – meaning many of its capital costs are ultimately reflected not in property taxes but in user rates paid by residents and businesses.
So, in addition to likely paying more in taxes, city water users might see water bills do in future years what their energy bills have done in the past year.
In other words, whether through tax bills or utility rates, the cost of these large-scale projects will eventually reach the public.
None of this necessarily suggests the projects are unnecessary: Many are tied to regulatory requirements, system reliability and long-term planning needs that local officials say can’t be ignored any longer. Water treatment upgrades, in particular, are being driven in part by evolving federal and state standards related to contaminants such as PFAS.
But it’s just hard to see how city and county taxpayers will be able to pay for all this, especially with gas prices sky high and the price of eggs still to high.
who did we hire for our city budget office? the folks who got booted out of winston for doing the same thing? i still am completely astonished. i mean 40 million dollars and still complete silence not a peep. how can they get away with this? winston is such a cesspool of wokeness and low iq government employees. what a big joke
Scott, can you find out what the county’s revenue neutral rate would be? The budget office has had the number for months but its not published. The city hasn’t published theirs either but I heard it is about 53 cents.
Why not make it easy on the eyes of readers and start using a capital letter on sentences.
joe, can u see the lower case letters
JOE CAN YOU READ THIS?
my point, exactamundo.
County commissioners need to stop funding their own special interest projects that do nothing for the county, one example is the “civil rights museum”. Why are individuals on the list awarded/given money ? Do these individuals serve the community or themselves? An example is Greensboro city councils,” Cure for Violence “ that gave millions to a project with NO accountability. How did that workout for the city taxpayers? Was crime and the murder rate reduced?
The taxpayers & citizens of Guilford county have a right to see, examine and be informed where every dollar is going and to whom said dollar is going to for what purpose.
Anything less could be seen as deceptive or corruption by our commissioners.
If we study working and failing city/state financial models across America certain common points stand out.
Governments will never have enough money to meet their long list of wants and needs.
We are going to have to reduce the list or we will go broke and accomplish little. Government are falling under the weight of their own size.
An educational book on the subject written by the famous Dr. Seuss years ago illustrates this. Check out Yertle the Turtle.
S Else: ‘squeaking wheels’ are getting the ‘oil’ from useful, successful, ‘wheels’
My wife and I are on a fixed income. I’m beginning to think the frog has a good idea.
sailor, compare your ‘fixed income’ to NO or UNRELIABLE income
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I’m beginning to suspect that Scott enjoys frog legs, and has discovered that the buggers do actually hop out of the pot even when you try cooking them slowly.
Bon appetit !
The school system could save money if they eliminated half of their mid and upper management. If I were in charge, I’d require a minimum 10 to 1 ratio of employees to supervisors or managers. As it is now, there is plenty of “bloat” in local government.
i wonder how much ‘management’ plato, socrates, pliny et al required i think a competent ‘tutor’ could educate 20 motivated students with ZERO overhead & make $$ income & each student could fund it @ $4 – 5k per year
i wonder with you….
Remember this the next time you see the local and state governments espousing about the incentive package they offered to lure someone like Boom Industries to come here, a company more suited to New York City or London where Concorde was located. Also, when you hear the local governments taking off for “retreats” in the Caribbean, you`ll know your tax dollars are being well-spent.
There has long been the question of”how do you eat an elephant?”. City and county leadership has been trying this for a long time, knowing the average taxpayer won’t object to the smaller numbers.
Only voters can end the spendthrift approach these hedonistic fools are offering as “ for the good of the people “
Why did we not use all the 100s of millions of dollars the federal government gave to Guildford County in all those Covid funding. Instead the county government added jobs, increased people’s salaries and spent those funds on projects we did not need.
When you add jobs and increase wages those expenses keep on coming as when you spend it on infrastructure like water and sewer systems you spend it once with no increases later on. We have a bunch of people that don’t have a clue on how to run this very large government expenses we have now. Unless we begin to look at these cost differently we are cooked.
The fact is that these projects are being proposed now because Skip knew that a revaluation would bring in a significant amount of property taxpayer money. So, now with an influx of property taxpayer money, this would be a perfect time to start his pie-in-the-sky projects. *Guilford County does not need a new government campus. How long has the county operated in the same buildings that are currently occupied? Nix the new government campus, Skippy. I don’t want to pay for it. That should save property taxpayer money. **Nix the costly and unnecessary school expenses, like the proposed but unneeded new school on Boylston Rd. If a state statute allows the county to borrow money because a school bond has been paid down, why not use bond money for some of your pet projects, Skippy? If a county can use funny money from a loan paydown, why not just use the bond money for some other purpose other than schools? ***Cut positions within the county that are unnecessary and provide no value to property taxpayers. ****With spot zoning, there is no need for a countywide water system. So, nix that. With spot zoning, eventually there will be only city (Greensboro or High Point) government.
A troubling aspect of county government is that not all property owners pay property taxes. Nary a peep is heard from the nonprofit property owner. People complain about unfair taxes, and rightfully so. But it is so unfair for nonprofits to not pay their fair share of government that the taxpaying property owners do. Why are nonprofits so special that all other property taxpayers pay their property tax because nonprofits aren’t required by government. The same government that will take my home, your home if we don’t pay our property taxes.
Since Jeff Thigpen likes to study data as he is currently doing with corporate ownership of local homes, let’s have him or more specifically the tax department do a study to determine the amount of property taxes that would be paid to the county if every nonprofit paid their fair share. By nonprofit, it is meant every spelling of the word for nonpayment of property taxes i.e. nonprofit, non-profit, tax-exempt, charitable organizations, public charity, private foundation, not-for-profit, churches, mosques, synagogues, or any other places of worship.
ditto, termlimits
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The Democrats are locking in a high and ever increasing tax burden – for decades to come.
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If they were really on the side of the regular folk, they’d want lower taxes. The Democrats are on the side of government and the entire public sector. That’s who they really represent.
The Republicans are much more aligned with the people.
The Left represents the government.
The Right represents the governed.
‘Twas ever so.
a million here, a million there; first thing we’ll be talking about real money.
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Shades of Everett Dirksen.
shades of darth vader & popeye. clean up your tropes austin if u want to ‘influence’. majority rule is not by ‘the brightest & the best’. the ‘brightest & the best’s’ nemesis is that ‘majority’
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I have no idea what you’re talking about, Markl. Were you drunk?
My comment referenced the famous remark attributed to US Sen. Everett Dirksen : “A billion here, a billion there, pretty soon you’re talking real money”
The only thing here that needs cleaning up is your unintelligible Pidgin English, buddy.
How do you know this?
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It’s just part of being culturally literate and well educated, Miller.
teach me, o master.
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Well you asked the question, and that’s the answer.
People sometimes ask me how I know this or that, and I just don’t know how I know. I can’t remember how I learned about “X”. All I know is that I’m always learning.
I can spend hours exploring Wikipedia, for example. Years ago, my wife would make fun of me because I’d look up a word in a dictionary and spend half an hour with my nose in the book. One word leads to another.
I’ve always possessed intellectual curiosity.
I have posted this in other articles
On the night of December 16th in the year of our Lord 1773, a band of American patriots, the Sons of Liberty, boarded ships of King George anchored in the harbor of Boston. The cargo on board was English tea that George ordered to be sold with a 3p tax, an amount while sounding small, was still a slap in the face of the colonists, but King George didn’t care. We were just colonists…nobodies.
These patriots proceeded to demonstrate their disgust for this by dumping the tea over the side thus putting into history The Boston Tea Party.
This protest against the Tea Act and “taxation without representation” directly led to the American Revolutionary War.
Am I advocating for another Revolutionary War? No, but I am advocating for what the war resulted in; a free people who are governed by people whom they elect to represent THEM, to do what is right for THEM, not create a fiefdom to be run for THEIR friends, family and followers.
I have referred to them as the Guilford County Board of Commissars. My belief is this pretty well describes them and how they rule…not govern, but rule.
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I think that’s the 4th time you’ve said it, Patrik. Give it a rest, man.