Letter: Durkee Misleads Ward 6 Voters on Property Tax Issue

In recent campaign statements, Ward 6 candidate Sean Durkee has attacked his opponent, Councillor Sharline Nabulime, for a City Council vote taken on November 26, 2018 regarding a resolution to raise the Residential Property Tax exclusion from 30% to 35%. Mr. Durkee has erroneously suggested that Councillor Nabulime's (unsuccessful) vote against this measure indicates that she would have raised residential property taxes by $2,400 per year for every homeowner. This statement is both 100% incorrect and malicious, and either reflects Mr. Durkee's ignorance on a critical municipal taxation issue, or a willful attempt to mislead voters. Let me explain.

Under the Commonwealth's Municipal Modernization Act, cities and towns are allowed to exempt up to 35% of the value of the average single family home in a municipality in setting the tax rate for all Residential properties (this is currently a figure of $186,000). The higher the exclusion percentage used, the higher the resulting Residential tax rate must be to raise the total revenues required in the City budget. Councillor Nabulime and four other Councillors voted to retain the previous exclusion percentage of 30%, but was unsuccessful. The dollar difference between the 30% and 35% exclusion for the average homeowner in Waltham? About $100. Not the $2,400 suggested by Mr. Durkee. The reality is that whatever Residential Exclusion percentage the City sets (anything from 0% to 35%) the City's residential tax levy (the total amount of residential property taxes collected, citywide) does NOT change -- only the distribution among homeowners changes. In simple terms, the higher the exclusion percentage, the greater the tax burden on higher value properties, and the lower the tax burden on lower value properties.

If Councillor Nabulime is to be faulted for her vote, it is that she would have prevented an increase in property taxes for those whose homes exceed $687,000, who can surely afford to pay a little more. But we are not even remotely talking about an impact of $2,400 for each and every taxpayer. That is just an outright lie.

Shame on you, Mr. Durkee.