Why Maine property tax laws need to change

As a widow living in Brunswick for over 50 years, I live in fear of the current revaluation. The property purchased for $26,000 will likely be assessed a $1 million-plus. Even with an addition we added to the original winterized cottage, we spent nowhere near that. Yet, two nearby properties recently sold for over $1 million — in one the owners paid $1.9 million in cash have workers constructing a new kitchen and bathroom.

Older residents, small family businesses, and fishermen with waterfront properties could not purchase their own properties at the skyrocketing prices newcomers can easily pay. But recent sales generate property taxes longtime residents with limited incomes struggle to pay. No Mainer should have to sell one’s home because of rising property taxes. Other states have limited increases in taxes through legislation. The home of a friend in California has market value well over $1 million dollars. Her taxes are only half of what I paid before revaluation.

We should base revaluation on a longer time frame to increase the number of sales used to determine value. Two years of sales in small communities will not yield an accurate assessment of property values. If revaluation were based on five to 10 years of sales data, abrupt increases due to changing circumstances, such as Covid, would be less dramatic and upsetting to taxpayers.

We should also create “discounts” for longtime, year-round residents without changing the current market value of the property.

Current market values (especially waterfront properties) generate incredibly high property taxes. Without changing the property’s value on the books, current year-round residents could receive a tax credit for every decade they have resided on the property. For instance, if the credit per decade were $2,000, someone living there for three years could deduct $6,000 from the total tax due. When the property is sold or transferred to a new owner, that deduction would no longer apply. Because these benefits would go to the oldest residents, the loss of revenue to the town would be temporary.

Maine is not the only state where people are being stressed by impossibly high property taxes. I’ve asked legislators to make reform a high priority to relieve the stress of older residents while non-Mainers continue to pay increasingly higher prices to live in our beautiful state.

Anne Wescott Dodd,
Brunswick

A new era in American politics

Why is it more difficult these days not to become cynical? When the Roberts Supreme Court, in 2010, ruled in favor of Citizens United, it already made a mockery of fairness in the political arena by allowing the unlimited influx of dark money into our local, state and national elections.

Presently, we are confronted with the antics of two billionaire narcissists with fragile egos and blatant self-serving ambitions who are hellbent on dismantling political norms, thereby destabilizing political discourse even further. Frighteningly, Donald Trump enjoys unprecedented presidential power, while Elon Musk has rather unlimited resources he can utilize (and has) to influence public opinion. We can neither be complacent, nor ignorant concerning their approach and tactics they are using to achieve their political and personal goals.

Governance by intimidation, executed with whatever means deemed necessary to succeed, regardless of possible harm to people and institutions, now appears to be the preferred modus operandi. If unopposed, a monopoly of unchecked power and wealth will be held and utilized by a carefully selected cohort of “oligarch team players.” At the same time, improving the lives of the American workforce, whose labor they actually require to succeed in their business ventures, does not appear to be one of their priorities, so inequality and injustice could actually rise to new heights.

Therefore, their agenda does not fulfill the promise of a better future, as Trump proclaimed, which so many Americans are hoping and have voted for. Undoubtedly, cynicism will continue to replace hope.

Sigrid R.E. Fischer-Mishler,
Harpswell