Monday, November 30, 2015

Hamilton County Officials Claim They Can't Afford To Allow Construction Of Lower-Priced Homes

There's quite a particularly galling story in the IBJ this week where Hamilton County officials openly talk about their desire not to have any new homes constructed in their community that aren't at a minimum price point that places many would-be homeowners out of the market. The gist of the story is that the state's property tax cap law means local governments can't afford to pay for extra fire, police and other services unless the property taxes generated from a new home hits a certain level. This supposed break-even price level for new homes is somewhere between $250,000 and $400,000 according to Lindsey Erdody, the story's author. The median price of new homes being built in Hamilton County is about $230,000.

Municipalities in Hamilton County are forcing housing developers to meet minimum infrastructure requirements, which is pushing the median price of new homes upwards. “It’s a little frustrating,” Boomerang Development LLC President Corby Thompson said. "We’re at the point now where we can’t develop new housing for people of modest or below-modest incomes." Hamilton Co. officials complain that property tax caps are a chief culprit for the predicament they say they're facing. Fishers Mayor Scott Fadness even blamed the homestead deduction for reducing property taxes on residential property. "We need as much assessed value as possible," Fadness said.

Nowhere in the story is it mentioned that municipalities in Hamilton Co. have relied heavily on TIF districts to subsidize new development within their communities. One reader made this point in the comment section to the story. "In 2013, Hamilton County cities diverted over $48 million away from all taxing authorities," David Giffel wrote. "I can easily argue many of these developmentswould have happened, anyway." He continued, "The cities divert about $12 to $15 million away from their own General Funds! All so they can give this to business property tax developments! A developer of homes must pay for its infrastructure and so why not the same for business property owners? Then the problem is solved." Hey, don't confuse them with the facts, David.

11 comments:

Flogger said...

The Media in Central Indiana seems to need a permission slip to write articles that favor a certain point of view. Within that permission slip are topics to avoid like TIFs, Crony-Capitalism or Corporate Welfare. I suppose the the idea of a minimum valued home is bit like an invisible fence to keep out the proles who work for minimum wage as servers in restaurants, other fast food restaurant employees, retail clerks, etc., in Hamilton County. You can serve us, but not live here.

Anonymous said...

Malibu, CA long ago figured out how to keep low class citizens out of Malibu. Having voted with their feet once (to escape IPS and corrupt Marion County) they are not about to have their lives turned back into a hell hole. So, their support for "Mass Transportation" schemes tends to support Flogger's view that their desire is for more cheap labor and a tax deduction for domestic servants as well as an ending of social security taxes on maids, porters, caddies, cooks and lawn care folks...sorta explains Chamber of Commerce sorts desiring cheap labor so as to hide the costs of corporate corruption.

Anonymous said...

Hiya Flogger. I like your comment. Here's the thing. I've posted this before. I've lived all over the country and NOWHERE is the pressure to conform as great as it is in the Midwest in general and Indiana in particular. People here simply cannot bear to believe that many criminals look just like they do and believe the same things they believe. They think that if they close their eyes and cover their ears it will all go away. It doesn't, of course, but they believe it does. Thus, nothing bad will EVER be written about white Republicans (not conservatives. I'm a conservative and a recovering Republican) who have no problem with government largess as long as it benefits the people doing the writing and their friends and neighbors. Of course, this is incredibly shortsighted and will hasten the demise of the sewer known as Indianapolis, but I have been observing for a long time and I am convinced that they really to believe that if they pretend it's not happening that it really is not happening.

Anonymous said...

In June the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that federal housing law allows people to challenge lending rules, zoning laws and other housing practices that have a "disparate" or harmful impact on minority groups, even if there is no proof that companies or government agencies intended to discriminate. Two weeks later, after getting the Supreme Court's okay, the Obama administration issued a final rule intended to move poor people "into communities that are rich with opportunity," as HUD Secretary Julián Castro phrased it in his news release.
The new regulation is all about "affirmatively furthering fair housing," HUD says.

To help localities identify patterns of racial and ethnic disrimination, HUD will provide states, local governments, pubic housing agencies and the general public with maps, charts and other data showing integrated and segregated living patterns; racially or ethnically concentrated areas of poverty and wealth; the location of subsidized housing; and where some people have "access to opportunity" based on "key community assets," such as good schools and job opportunities.

The data will help HUD grantees -- and community activists! -- analyze the "fair housing landscape and set locally-determined fair housing priorities and goals," HUD said.

HUD, in its new role as central planner, will review those locally determined priorities and goals, using federal funding as the means to achieve its will.

If communities want to continue receiving federal housing funds, they must spend the money in ways that move inner-city minorities, for example, into subsidized housing in wealthier, whiter suburbs.

One way or another, Hamilton County is going to get more inner city blacks calling Carmel home. The more they gentrify, the more they put a target on their backs for the feds anxious to enforce the new reality; that federal housing law allows people to challenge lending rules, zoning laws and other housing practices that have a "disparate" or harmful impact on minority groups, even if there is no proof that companies or government agencies intended to discriminate.

Flogger said...

ANON 12:15 I agree with the conformity comment. I drove up to Car-Mel a couple of years ago. The new buildings all appeared to be colored "cowpie" brown with the same boring architecture. I read all the glowing reports about our new at the time Airport was built and completed. When I went there it was for the most part Hospital White. Some body should have found some talented graffiti taggers to liven it up.

Maybe the conformity is just a visual Prozac for us. We would not want architectural creativity and colors other than cowpie brown white, IU Red, Colts Blue or Pacers Gold to arouse unHoosier thoughts.

Anonymous said...

Anon 12:15- enjoyed your Comment, especially your accurate statement that "white Republicans" are not the same as "Conservatives". I too am a "recovering Republican". While I doubt I will ever in my life again vote for a Democrat, I am sure I will never ever again knowingly vote for a Karl Rove-John McCain-Mitt Romney type of guy nor for a goofball like Jeb Bush. I even wonder if I shall vote again. Under the current corrupt Democrat and Republican system, there is little actual "choice" at the polls when you have the candidates chosen by the political machines.

Anon 12:28 YAHTZEE! YOU ARE CORRECT. Marxist Barak Obama effectively socialized the suburbs with his HUD Department's "Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing". This is another inaccurately titled left liberal socialist program that effectively will allow the force of the leviathan federal State to REMOVE CHOICE from the residential housing market. It will not matter where you live, you will not be allowed to make a choice of the types of neighbors you have because the State now has the right to force you to live with persons of all backgrounds in the pursuit of the Left Liberal Religion of "Equality". It is coming and it is coming soon to a neighborhood near you... people will be planted in your backyard whether you like it or not.

Anonymous said...

Anon 12:28 and 2:18 PM - So we're going to have to pay HIGHER costs for housing in order to subsidize the thuggz to live next door (and break-in, murder, rape, etc.) ... and you wonder why there's "domestic terrorist" groups like the KKK out there.

Anonymous said...

Call it what it is....segregation (based on income). A perfectly micromanaged community. Funny, I don't hear or see a peep from Rep. Bosma, Rep. Susan Brooks or former Rep. Burton. Why??? Because "modest" people don't have the dollars to buy Ms. Brooks and Mr. Bosma (or any other politician) influence. The modest is what country is made of and their voice is getting smaller and smaller.

Anonymous said...

There are huge apartment complexes being built all over Carmel.
I watched Pike Township go from a safe middle class suburb to a high crime area in one generation, and the apartments were the conduit. I don't think it will matter what the home prices are, it is inevitable that Carmel will become an urbanized extension of Indianapolis. It has already begun.

Sir Hailstone said...

9:05 PM - The difference here is those Carmel apartments go for about $900+ per month rent and no government subsidies. The Pike Township apartments you speak of (or many apartments in Marion County outside the downtown "Mile Square") go for about $600-800 per month and many of the owners/investors signed up the accept Section 8 and Section 42 subsidies in order to keep the apartments filled and pockets filled with market rate rents in an area that economically wouldn't support "market rate".

Now will Carmel property investors eventually seek out the government subsidies in order to prop up market rents when the rental market declines? That remains to be seen.

Anonymous said...

$900/month?! What apartments are you looking at?! Try $1400-1500/month! AND UP!