Lawn Mowing Bills Eating Up City Budgets

Spike,

"Around the nation, cities and towns facing grim budget circumstances are grasping at unlikely — some would say desperate — means to bolster their shrunken tax bases. Like Beatrice, places like Dayton, Ohio, and Grafton, Ill., are giving away land for nominal fees or for nothing in the hope that it will boost the tax rolls and cut the lawn-mowing bills."

The City of Burlington, with invaluable assistance from State Senator Courtney, spent millions to create a vacant lot. Where once property taxes were paid, pig weed proliferates.

A forlorn for sale sign and caveat emptor comedy of a web site have not sold the property.

Has the time come to divide up the property and offer it up as urban homesteads for those willing and with the means to improve the property?

Sick of paying for it all