There are two primary reasons:
(1) Village residents are frustrated by the combination of tax inequities along with the vilification of them as a group of people. Much misinformation has been pushed maligning them as fiscally irresponsible, when the truth is that they pay twice for services such as the fire department and library. Please see this link for a more thorough explanation of the tax inequity situation. This is why when merger failed, a large percentage of residents that live in the Village became proponents of full separation from the town. Since full separation is now a likely result of a failed merger, TOV residents are getting a second chance to vote on merger now that this new information available. A no vote on merger is no longer a vote for status quo, it’s essentially a vote for separation (or at a minimum it invites the possibility).
(2) Vermont statute allows any voter to petition for a revote for any ballot question within 30 days of the original vote. This does not apply to elected officials. A revote petition needs to include signatures from at least 5% of the registered voters. The petition for the revote of the merger EXCEEDED the 5% threshold with 825 valid signatures filed with the Essex Town Clerk. When a petition is filed that meets all the requirements, the Selectboard has no choice but to warn a vote within 60 days of the petition filing date. Reference to that statute can be found here: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/17/055/02661
The date of April 13th, 2021 was chosen for the revote because the Village Annual Meeting and Essex Westford School District budget votes are already taking place on that date. By holding the merger revote on this date, the Selectboard is saving taxpayers up to $25,000, which is what it would cost to hold a separate election for the revote at a later date.
Yes. On the ballot that Village-only residents will receive as part of the April 13th vote, will be an advisory article. This article asks the Village Trustees to look as separation specifically if the merger revote fails. The Village does not need permission of the Town to separate. Winooski separated from Colchester in 1921 in a similar way.
One way to think about this question is to think about the Village of Essex Junction and the Town of Essex as housemates. The Village comprises 42% of the tax base. So if you were to lose a housemate paying 42% of the bills, you are faced with either eliminating some of the services that you have been used to, or you are going to have to cover the costs that the housemate used to contribute. This is the same for those of us living in the town outside of the village, if the Village decides to separate. We will either have to drastically cut services to maintain a reasonably similar amount of taxes, or we will have to dramatically raise taxes in order to compensate for the loss of the tax base. Realistically, it will probably be somewhere in between which is the worst of both worlds. We will be stuck with dramatically higher taxes AND we will still lose a lot of services.
You can see here in this link a model of various scenarios from merger to full separation. This presentation has been publicly available since September 2020.
In the first scenario that is covered, the Village separates but still agrees to continue sharing almost all services with the town but the Village would demand tax parity (so no longer paying double for services that most only use once). This would cause a tax increase to TOV residents of roughly 19%. That would be about $288 per year increase in municipal taxes for a home that is assessed at $280,000. This tax increase would happen on year 1 of the change. If we look at this increase over the proposed 13 year phase-in period included in the merger proposal, this would create a cumulative spending change of $3,744 over 13 years.
It is important to note that this is not the language of the separation proposal that Village residents will be voting on in March. That separation petition is for full separation, with the exception of possibly continuing to share a police department. However, they are not required to share a police department with the Town of Essex. The Village could also contract with Williston and share the costs with them. They have options.
So let’s look at the second scenario (referred to as Range 2 in the presentation), which is if the Village separates from the town but refuses to share any services with the town. This would result in a tax increase of 51.5% for residents living in the Town outside of the Village. If we look at the same home assessed at $280,000 that would be a municipal tax increase of $777 per year beginning on year 1 of the change. This would create a cumulative spending change of $10,101 over the same 13 year phase-in period that the merger plan proposes.
While it is true that the Village probably could not fully separate on January 1st, 2022, many changes could be made rather abruptly. At a minimum, the Village would demand tax parity while we share some services, so the 19% tax increase discussed above in scenario one (Range 1) would almost certainly kick in on January 1st, 2022 (or whenever is decided by the Village Trustees). After that initial tax hike, the rest of the tax increase would happen over an unknown number of years while the Village and Town divorced.
And of course, let us not forget to juxtapose these changes against the cost of merger. The tax increase to town outside the village residents is estimated to be about 22.8%. On the same $280,000 assessed home as used in the previous two scenarios, this would cause $338 per year increase in municipal taxes after 13 years of a gradual phase-in. This means that our municipal taxes would increase $26 each year. This would create a cumulative spending change of $2,366 over the 13 year phase-in period. Due to the phase-in, the cost of merger is actually less than the cost of separating from the village while sharing all of our services.
No. IBM paid property taxes to the Village and the Town. It also paid a “Machinery & Equipment” subsidy (called M&E) worth millions of dollars annually to both the Village AND THE TOWN.
The Essex Town government routinely received substantially more IBM tax and M&E revenues annually than the Village government did. What some may be misremembering is that IBM gave significantly more M&E revenue to the Village school district than the Town school district. When the Vermont Legislature approved Act 60 in 1995, it ended the M&E subsidy for Village schools. In 1999, IBM, the Town, and the Village agreed to phase out the M&E tax altogether over the next 12 years.
No. The Essex Westford School District serves three communities: Essex Town, Essex Junction and Westford. EWSD is a separate entity from Essex Town and the Village of Essex Junction. Separation of the Town and the Village will not separate the school district.
NOTE: We are continually updating our Merger FAQ page. If there are particular topics that you would like researched, please let us know.