Bellingham Herald Editorial, Fact-Challenged

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I must admit Saturdays Opinion piece by the Bellingham Heralds Editorial Board turned out to be good for a laugh. They challenged the Whatcom County Council & Administration to fix the way property taxes are re-assessed.

Tax time a reminder system still needs fixing

THE BELLINGHAM HERALD EDITORIAL BOARD - THE BELLINGHAM HERALD

Whatcom County property owners began receiving their tax bills for 2009 on Friday, Feb. 13.

We'd like to challenge the members of the Whatcom County Council, and the county administration office, to do the right thing in 2009 and - after a too-long delay - modify the property tax assessment system so that it more fairly divides up taxes among property owners annually. ...(full editorial)

It sound like a problem that really needs fixin'.

The only problem with the Editorial Boards idea is that the County Council and the Assessor are already fixing the problem, as County Councilman Carl Weimer pointed out in a comment left on the Heralds website:

carlweimer wrote on February, 15 10:25 AM:

Good editorial, except I guess you missed the inclusion and passage in the budget last year by the County Council for an upgrade in the Assessor/Treasurer's computer systems to allow them to go to these annual appraisals. Many of us wondered why it cost so much ($2.9 million)and would take so long (a couple years), but we did approve the money because we see the value and fairness in an annual system. The County's Assessor, Keith Willnauer, told us that once the system was in place he would be able to do the annual appraisals at the same or less cost than the every four year system. Hope this helps clarify that this switch is in the works.

Looks like the Bellingham Heralds Editorial Board's zeal in criticizing all things 'government' got in the way of looking into the facts. Oops...