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Bradbury Township
Mille Lacs County, Minnesota |
Mille Lacs News Since 4/18/07 |
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The Minnesota Department of Revenue says that NEXUS is TAXABLE!
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Letters to the Editor
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If NEXUS gets tax abatement, the rest of us will pay their share with our higher taxes. It's not right. |
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8/31/2007 Don’t be fooled. “It’s not a threat, we simply cannot afford to pay $100,000 in property taxes”. These are words coming from CEO D’Angelo of Nexus Inc. in last weeks Mille Lacs Messenger. Coming from a corporation that has an annual budget of $38 million dollars and can pay their CEO over $250,000/year makes such a statement very hard to swallow. Even just making such an assertion is a slap in the face to every taxpaying resident and business in the county. At a time when corporate welfare and greed has come under the microscope, it is hard to believe that people are still trying to get away with such behavior. The State has reaffirmed that Nexus, Inc is not tax exempt. Seems pretty plain and simple to me. But rather than pay their taxes like the rest of us, or pack up and leave Mille Lacs County like they originally threatened, Nexus now plans to apply for tax abatement. A rather hollow request after questionable tactics in trying for complete tax exemption in the first place. Instead of approaching the location and building of a new facility in an above-board fashion, they chose to pull certain strings and mount a campaign that played upon people’s fears. We were led to believe that Onamia would basically dry and up and blow away if Nexus leaves town. In actuality, of the 133 jobs that would be “lost”, less than 30 employees actually live in Onamia and the surrounding area. The benefits to local businesses are limited to very few. We need to urge our County Commissioners to look closely at this application and the effect it will have locally and county wide. Don’t let the benefits of a few outweigh the needs of the entire county. A new $10 million facility can surely pay it’s share of property tax. Tax abatement is a tool that should be used by counties and cities to compete against each other to attract new business. Although Nexus would like us to believe this, we are not competing with anyone. They have demonstrated over and over by their maneuvering that they want to be here. At a time when many of us are being asked to increase our own taxes through a school referendum, offering tax abatement to a multi-million dollar corporation simply does not make any sense at all. John Barsody Onamia
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