What do you really think about property taxes?

As a former Omaha city council member, I’m fairly experienced in hearing from people about their property taxes.

But even after all these years, sometimes I’m not totally sure what people mean when they say they want things to change.

After all, “property tax relief” can mean different things to different people.

One person might hear that phrase and think about saving money on their tax bill. Others might fear the possibility of added tax hikes to accomplish that goal, or even a big cut in the local school’s budget.

I want to try to help clear up the confusion. My organization, the Platte Institute, is conducting a new property tax reform survey online at PlatteInstitute.org/Survey.

I’d appreciate it if you’d participate by sharing your thoughts about what property tax reform means to you, and what you believe needs to be done to accomplish it.

The survey is only 11 brief tax policy questions, and the Platte Institute team plans to share your input with policymakers and the media in Nebraska, to help create a better picture of which approaches should be on the table as the Legislature starts fresh on property tax reform in 2019.

Nowadays, lots of organizations release surveys just for show—full of softball questions—to create the appearance that they’re listening to you. I want to assure you that we really intend to study this survey to help improve the legislative process in Nebraska.

We want to challenge taxpayers to go into greater detail about the tough policy choices they’re willing to consider when it comes to changing Nebraska’s property tax system. We’ll release the results as we continue to publish more research on Nebraska’s property tax debate.  
 

We’ve already received many great responses, with a wide variety of ideas, so I hope you will consider adding your point of view as well.