Everyone I know who lives here is pleased to live in BP. We each chose this community. And among reasons we did, it is without doubt that we were each attracted to the quiet and uncomplicated nature of the Park. It's all homes, mostly single family, and a couple of municipal buildings. And a park. That's it. There's one street that isn't a pretty small lane. It's 6th Avenue. Our big traffic problem: a County road where the speed limit is 30. It used to be 30 everywhere in the Park, but now it's 25 on every street except 6th Avenue.
So that's it. A real sleepy little burg. We don't have any local businesses, which is good, because we don't have any parking, except for a rim around the park. This is the upside. Again, it's what we're all doing here. But there's a downside, too. We support ourselves, and our only real and meaningful way of getting money is from property taxes, and the fees involved in being residents. Sometimes we made ends meet, and sometimes we didn't. But our opportunity has always been essentially marginal. If residents are delinquent in paying their property taxes, it's a problem. There's not much play, and not much fat in the budget. Things are better now, since we have an amazing Manager who gets very creative and watches our budget like a hawk, but it really doesn't take much to throw the budget off.
In the last three years, we encountered a very serious problem. The spigot got turned way down. The economy crashed, and between people on their own marginal budgets and people who caved in, we wound up with a growing inventory of vacant or underperforming properties, which were no longer producing property taxes. And the rest of the properties experienced decreased assessed value, some dramatically so. This was due both to the economy and to the extra homestead exemption applied to all homesteaded properties. At that point, the Village developed a crisis. We have done a lot to diminish expenses, and measures included personnel attrition and cutbacks. Raises have been minimal or suspended, and benefits have been adjusted down. As far as I understand, we are at bare bones now.
Regarding property taxes, and those who pay them, we have two broad classes of taxpayers at this point. One class is those who were paying a high tax before, and after revaluation and double homestead exemption, these homeowners are paying less tax than they were. The other class of taxpayer is those who have been here long enough to have bought houses for comparatively little money, gotten homestead exemptions, and locked in a low rate, which can only go up 3% a year. These homeowners experienced tax increases in each of the last three years. But you have to think about this. What has happened is that these homeowners were paying such an unbelievably, and irrationally, low tax, that if property values declined significantly, and the homestead exemption was doubled, they were still so far behind the current standard that their taxes actually went up. It's pretty amazing when you think about it.
So here's what we have. We live in a very special kind of neighborhood, and we live here because we like the way it is. We support the neighborhood, and our lives in it, by paying property taxes. We're all now behind what is required. This neighborhood cannot survive the way we're going. It is starving. If we want the neighborhood we each chose, we're going to have to pay for it, just as we did before. And those who weren't paying for the neighborhood they want have to pay for it now. If we don't, we will have less police presence, less public works, and we will lose our Manager. On our present budget, we can't pay her enough to keep her. And for short money, we'll replace her with someone inexperienced or not very good.
We are called upon to step up to the plate. Those of us who had tax decreases in the last three years may have felt relief. But we originally signed on to our homes, the values were higher, and the taxes were higher. And we paid them. We have to swallow hard and get ready to give back some of the savings. We could pay the higher tax when we paid it before, and unless we have had unexpected reverses, we can pay it now. And that's what we have to do. The homeowners who have been coasting for years, living off those who paid high taxes, have to get real and write part of the check they have been protected from writing. We all have to pay more to our Village, not because the law forces us to, but because we like our "home, and we want to preserve it. No one is going to do it but ourselves. There are no commercial pockets to pick.
My suggestion is that we begin by agreeing to pay an extra $100 a year per property. It's low, but it's a start. It will go to the general revenue of the Village. And like any other "tax," it's tax-deductible. In addition, each of us should pay $20 a year to the Foundation. This is for special projects. So far, it's $120 a year. That's equal to a Starbucks coffee about once a week. Or the discount version of the economy car wash at Busy Bee less often than once a week. It's dinner at an inexpensive restaurant three to five times a year. Etc. This is chicken feed. It's nothing. And it's for our Village! Our home! We don't have a reason not to extend ourselves this way.
And I have one other request. We have a nice little sculpture in Griffing Park. In time, we should acquire more pieces of public art. There's no reason not to have many such pieces in BP. We have plenty of public green spaces, and it would greatly enhance our lives, the experience of being home in Biscayne Park, and our property values, if we made a sculpture garden of the Park. Once the Foundation develops a pattern of endowment, through that $20 a year from each of us or through other donations, it is likely that the Foundation will use its money to acquire public art for the Village. In the meantime, it's something those of us who are most interested will have to do for ourselves and the rest of us. I'm trying to raise $10,000 to buy a beautiful piece of sculpture. I have pledges of $4600. So I need commitments of $5400 more. I'm looking for people who will pledge anywhere from $100 to $1000. That's the range of current pledges, of which I have about 14. Most of them are between $200 and $500. So please let me know. And give the Village $100. Ana Garcia will take it, or Maria Camara will. Say I sent you. Or just say you felt in the mood. But let's show pride in our neighborhood, and make sure we maintain the surroundings we wanted when we picked BP for our home.
Thanks.
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