October 11, 2005
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[sighing] I love Fort Worth. I do. Really.
But I loathe the Fort Worth
city council’s regrettable enthusiasm for forced annexation of
unincorporated property. As a story in today’s Star-Telegram (probably requiring free registration) says:
A bumper crop of protest signs has sprouted along the streets of the Willow Springs Ranch subdivision in northwest Tarrant County.
"No forced annexation" declares a yellow-and-black sign at an entrance to the neighborhood.
Other signs in front of upscale homes show a red circle with a line through it over the words "Involuntary Annexation."
Saying they don't want to pay city taxes for unwanted services, subdivision residents are fighting a proposal by Fort Worth to annex Willow Springs and a dozen other areas on Nov. 8. Although public hearings on the annexation have already taken place, some residents say they plan to show up at today's City Council meeting to speak out.
"We are getting the services we rely on from the county," said Willow Springs resident Anna Sadler. "We are going to be paying $2,700 a year more in taxes for services we don't need."
Most of the homes draw water from wells, have their own septic systems and are protected by the Tarrant County Sheriff's Department and area fire departments, Sadler said. Her family already pays more than $7,500 a year in school and county taxes, she said.
Willow Springs is in a 12-square-mile area along U.S. 287 that has been identified by Fort Worth for annexation. In 2003, the city annexed the area -- at the time undeveloped -- for limited purposes, giving Fort Worth some regulatory powers but exempting residents from paying city taxes.The city indicated then that it would proceed with full annexation, under which residents must pay city taxes and the city must extend services.
First of all, if forced annexation doesn’t qualify as “no taxation
without representation,” I don’t know what does. Oh, sure,
they’ll inherit a city councilman to go along with those brand,
spanking-new taxes, but that’s no help. It’s utterly incredible
to me that a city can just decide someone’s house is now in that city
when it wasn’t before, and that they’re going to be the recipient of
unneeded services for which they’ll be charged, like it or not.Annex vacant land, fine. Annex occupied land when a majority of the landowners vote approval for it, fine. Just muscle in and take over?
That stinks. OTOH, thinking about how city’s have begun
wielding the eminent domain club with more verve than righteousness, I
suppose it’s all of a piece.Second, Fort Worth is BIG ENOUGH. We don’t need any more people, having already hit over 600K people as it is.
Comments (2)
Right on!! And now they are going to build new resevoirs in East Tx to serve the larger population they expect in 40 years. Why can’t we just quit growing? What advantage is bigger over better. ?? Enough already, this is a semiarid area!! They forget that!!
Huh. That’s interesting. I think that kind of issue is impossible in PA, because we don’t have any “unincorporated property” as you seem to be describing. Every inch of land belongs either to a township (an unincorporated municipality, yet a distinct one with its own elected officials), a borough (small to medium sized town) or a city. The other side of the coin is that all public services are then provided by the township, borough, or city, not the city next door, or a larger entity like the county. So through electing their own township government, the folks in the country and ‘burbs can decide for themselves which services they want, and want to pay for, and which they don’t. (Of course, the no taxation without representation thing can still happen, because cities are allowed to impose a payroll tax on non-resident workers. Grrrr.)
I wonder if the way all of Texas isn’t carved up and accounted for the way PA is, is an historical accident, or a result of a Texan spirit of independency (“I don’t need no gummint telling me what to do if I live out in the country”) or what?
At any rate, I agree, it stinks what they’re doing.