The Patrick County Board of Supervisors (BOS) raised Fiscal Year 2020 real estate taxes by $1,800,000 (19 percent). The first installment on the tax increase, an additional $900,000 over the previous year, was paid by taxpayers in June, 2019. Now, not even four months later, we learn there may not be enough money to pay the health insurance bills of the county’s employees.
The BOS is considering borrowing money from a “payday loan” to fund the health insurance payments. They prefer to call the “payday loan” a Revenue Anticipation Note (RAN). In reality they “anticipate” taking more of the taxpayer’s “payday” to continue to fund their complete and utter incompetence.
You just have to shake your head in bewilderment when you read in The Enterprise that Weiss and Boyce want to buy the decrepit and defunct Patrick County hospital, yet the BOS cannot pay the employees’ health insurance bills? Those two must be planning on a lot more “anticipation.”
Ask yourself the simple question: How long can the taxpayers of Patrick County continue to afford the abject incompetence of the management and political leadership of Patrick County?
Bill Moore
Woolwine
