CONDON’S CORNER
Where's the money going? Albemarle should not have raised the real estate property tax rate
© Marlene A. Condon 2025 All Rights Reserved
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| Taxpayers (even in Greene County) needlessly pay for school buses that many parents don’t utilize for their children. In addition to wasting taxpayer money, these parents are also contributing to global warming by polluting our local air as they wait in very long lines to reach the school. |
Many reasons could be enumerated for why the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors was wrong to raise the real estate property tax rate by four cents per $100 of value. Perhaps the most important objection is that many long-time residents are suffering the burden of ever-increasing real estate assessments and tax rates that accompany them.
Just recently a repairman in his twenties came to my
house. He told me it was his last week working for the company because he
couldn’t afford to stay in this area. He grew up here and wanted to remain, but
his salary, that he was quite content with, “didn’t go far enough”. So, he
would be leaving to live in another state. Local leaders should be ashamed that
native sons can’t afford to reside here.
(When builders only supply overly large houses or lavish
apartments containing such amenities as gourmet kitchens boasting expensive
appliances, “a beautiful sunroom”, or other such luxuries, they create a demand
for only those people with more money than the average joe to live here. We
don’t have affordable housing in this area only because builders don’t, or
can’t due to government zoning, build perfectly decent—rather than
ostentatious—places for folks to live.)
Of course, if the imposition of taxes upon citizens
included a morality factor, people would only pay taxes upon the original price
that they paid for a home instead of the newer and always rising assessments. No
one would be taxed out of his home simply because someone else decided to pay
an exorbitant amount for a house next door.
But my personal reason for not supporting the
tax-rate increase has to do particularly with the money going to schools.
Taxpayers aren’t getting their money’s worth.
Everyone has heard about abysmal test scores, even
though teachers have said they teach to the tests, which—let’s be honest here—is
akin to cheating. Tests are about making sure students learned well what they
were taught. They are not about virtually giving a child a cheat sheet
so he knows what the questions and answers will likely be!
What has gone wrong? I see the problem as the school
system having lost its bearings. It has somehow moved away from teaching the
vital basics, well known historically as “the 3 Rs”—“reading, ‘riting, and
‘rithmatic”—but of course, including other necessary subjects, such as civics,
biology, chemistry, etc.
Look at the Albemarle County High School Program of
Studies [2024-25HighSchoolProgramofStudies.pdf] and you would think
you are looking at courses offered to college students instead of those in high
school. What is the rush to push kids into career choices when students must
learn first, and learn well, the fundamental concepts that are used
every day throughout life and without which higher knowledge cannot be
obtained? To some, this Albemarle County curriculum may look impressive, but
it’s misguided. This drift away from
learning fundamentals began decades ago.
In the 1980s, I noticed that spelling mistakes and
the use of incorrect words started appearing in published documents, from
National Park Service newsletters to Time Magazine. I’ve always been a
voracious reader and I’d never before seen the likes of these kinds of errors.
I was at first extremely surprised and then puzzled
as to why such sloppiness had become rather commonplace. Not everyone can
master the intricacies of the English language, so some people are bound to
make mistakes in their writing. However, publishers typically employ
proofreaders who are capable of spotting these blunders and fixing them before
the manuscript goes out into the world. Why were proofreaders not catching
these flubs?
I remained perplexed until I decided at one point to
perhaps teach in the local high school. With a degree in physics and knowledge
of the advanced mathematics required to understand this field of science, I
knew I could assist students to learn about these two areas of study.
It was suggested that I spend a day observing
classes at Western Albemarle High School to see if teaching was right for me. I
did that—and came home at the end of the day feeling depressed. What I saw that
day appalled me because I knew the future would show the very real consequences
of what I’d viewed, and it has.
For example, it may seem a trivial matter if people
don’t pronounce words appropriately or grasp their meaning or spell them
correctly. However, these shortcomings mean you can’t communicate clearly with
others, which is the whole point of learning language skills. And you can
hardly get through life without being able to do math.
The math class I sat in on was a joke. The teacher
spoke for a grand total of ten minutes and the students were told to do their
homework for the rest of the class period. When I was in high school, every
teacher taught for the entire time (about 50 minutes) allotted for
class. Students did homework at home, which is why it’s called homework.
How much math do you think could be taught in ten minutes of instruction? Not
much.
I also sat in on a physics class. I had thought the
math class was bad; the physics class was far worse. The students were unruly,
ignoring the teacher as they yelled back and forth across the room to each
other while also throwing paper airplanes (no, the class wasn’t about
aerodynamics). How much physics do you think could be taught under these
conditions? Not much.
In other words, I did not get the impression that
anyone in Albemarle County—or perhaps anywhere in our country as everyone
follows suit— took learning seriously; neither school administrators or
teachers, nor parents.
Knowledge is power, but only if it springs from a
legitimate foundation of factual information. Nothing points to Albemarle
County children getting the education they need to succeed in life, despite all
of the money that is spent per student in the system. It’s time to stop
throwing good money after bad.
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