Well, the City of Cincinnati does control the Cincinnati Water Works, Metropolitan Sewer District, and big regional events such as Riverfest, Tall Stacks, etc. The City of Cincinnati has a majority control of Queen City Metro buses. The City of Cincinnati has a strong influence on the Cincinnati Public School District, which by the way is not limited to Cincinnati.

 

The Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County receives funds from suburban tax payers and carries the Cincinnati name.

 

  The Cincinnati Enquirer, Cincinnati Bell, (former) Cincinnati Gas and Electric Company, Greater Cincinnati airport, Cincinnati Reds, Cincinnati Bengals and more are private companies that carry the Cincinnati name.

 

A lot of suburban residents have Cincinnati mailing addresses.

 

So, the City of Cincinnati still has a heavy influence on suburban residents outside of the municipal boundaries. Quite frankly, a lot of folks don't understand the municipal boundaries. Back during the 2001 riots, when Mayor Luken called for a curfew, a lot of suburban residents stayed home just because they didn't know any better.

 

So yes, suburban residents see Cincinnati as calling the shots, whether for good or bad.

 

It is funny that you say this, because in my experience the Cincinnati region has one of the weakest relationships to its namesake city that I have ever seen. I grew up in the suburbs (like many if not most on this site, so I don't quite buy the "we don't understand the suburban point of view") and I know people who have never been downtown. To me, greater Cincinnati is pretty fragmented and insular.

 

I think you have a lot of good observations. But I wonder if the real culprit is not so much city-hating, as it is the illogical and overlapping patchwork of jurisdictions in this metro area, among many others. I think many people in the region don't understand because our interdependence is not clearly explained, and is not part of everyday awareness.

And we pay a lot of taxes to the city, and to the county which go to the city.

 

Who pays a lot of taxes to the city? Suburban residents? Or are you a city resident?

 

If you mean suburban residents, I wasn't aware of that. Can you explain?

 

Isn't there a payroll tax for Cincinnati?

  Greater Cincinnati is indeed very fragmented and insular.

 

  One of our fine township governments got overwhelmed with complaints last winter when the County Engineer, who has a longstanding history of excellent work clearing snow, failed to do a respectable job. The township maintains township streets, and the county maintains county roads. Yet, residents complained to the township when their county roads were not maintained well. This tells me that residents do not know the difference between a county road and a township street, or else they thought that the township has responsibility over county roads.

 

  Here's the kicker: these same residents have been voting for township road levies for years! Doesn't this tell you what a delusion elections are?

 

  We are drifting off topic, but my original point was that the streetcar does NOT have general support outside of the core city.

 

 

 

 

 

  "Isn't there a payroll tax for Cincinnati?"

 

  Yes there is, and I think it's 2.1%. Folks who live outside the city and are employed in the city get 2.1% docked from their paychecks.

 

  Businesses pay attention to this, and this is a significant reason why businesses locate outside of municipalities, because under state law municipalities can charge income taxes while townships cannot.

 

    This is a BIG deal and is probably several orders of magnitude more important than the streetcar ever will be.

 

 

Cincinnati levies the tax if you live in the city too.  I believe though that if you live in another municipality that has an income tax and you work in Cincinnati, you're not double-dipped.  There's some sort of reciprocity agreement between the cities to prevent that. 

 

That's getting away from the arguments about federal grants and such though.  Frankly, I wish we paid the bulk of our taxes locally instead of to the Feds.  Metro areas are generally exporters of tax money to the rest of the state (or the country), because of the way it's funneled to Washington, stirred into a big pot, then dolled out again.  That's a big part of my complaint earlier that "we pay all these taxes to the Federal Government then have to beg them to get it back." 

And we pay a lot of taxes to the city, and to the county which go to the city.

 

Who pays a lot of taxes to the city? Suburban residents? Or are you a city resident?

 

If you mean suburban residents, I wasn't aware of that. Can you explain?

 

Isn't there a payroll tax for Cincinnati?

 

Thank you Sherman.  Things that are obvious to some are completely missed by others.

 

  If the feds didn't have so much power, then we would be living in a different world.

 

  The Sixteenth Amendment to the Constitution gave the federal government the right to collect income taxes. It was passed in 1913. Can you imagine what life must have been like prior to 1913?

 

  From some of the historical threads on this site I think we can infer what it was like prior to 1913. The average citizen was more involved with his local government, rather than the federal government. If he lived in a city, he paid city taxes, and voted on city matters.

 

  Today the typical citizen pays a lot of taxes that go he knows not where.

Jake hit the nail that most of us know first hand the mentality of the suburbs. And Civvik nailed it, regarding the insularity. The suburbanites form their opinions on prejudices about the city, whereas we have legitimate judgments, not prejudgments, regarding the suburbs and their inhabitants.

 

Dan, do you live in KY?

No, do you?

 

 

  "The suburbanites form their opinions on prejudices about the city, whereas we have legitimate judgments, not prejudgments, regarding the suburbs and their inhabitants."

 

  The more I know, the more I find out I don't know. Every time I become familar with a new area and it's political situation, I learn about some nuance of government or local culture that I didn't know before.

 

    No one understands everything about metro Cincinnati. It is too big and complicated for one person to understand.

If you want to a raise a stink about a ton of money being collected by an organization connected to the city of cinncinnati and then spent in ways that seem to have a less than clear outcome, then lets talk about MSD and the billions the feds are forcing them to spend so the water is decent.

 

The streetcar amount barely pays for replacing a neighborhood's worth of combined sewers.

 

I'm sorry if suburbanites want that much say about how Cincinnati spends money then move into the city so you can vote for the elected officials. Otherwise, move to f'in Canada.

Man, calm down.

 

  "The streetcar amount barely pays for replacing a neighborhood's worth of combined sewers."

 

  No kidding.

 

  The EPA's policy on combined sewers has been a significant deterrent to new development in the core. I brought this up over a year ago in this very thread and was chided for being too negative.

 

Regarding the tax situation, don't forget that we in the city also pay taxes that go to the county for services that they don't provide in the city, such as the Sheriff's Department.  It's not all so easy to delineate.  Besides, people who work in Cincinnati get taxed on their income in Cincinnati, which helps pay for the services that their employer needs.  However, if someone works in Springdale and lives in Blue Ash, they don't pay Cincinnati anything.  It's not some big conspiracy. 

 

Eighth and State is absolutely right about the problems the EPA and the Clean Water Act are causing for development.  MSD is actually trying to do some of the right things, like the new rain gardens in Oakley Square and on Spring Grove Avenue in Winton Place (which are planted and nearly complete I might add).  There's also brick alleys they're rebuilding in OTR with a permeable gravel base.  These things reduce runoff and attempt to fix the problem at its source.  Despite that the EPA has basically told MSD they don't care and want a massive multi-billion dollar (like as much as the Brent Spence Bridge project) deep tunnel project that treats the symptom rather than the disease.  They want huge infrastructure projects that we simply can't afford. 

 

So what does this have to do with the streetcar?  There's basically a moratorium on net increases in density.  Big developments like the Banks or QCS and organizations like 3CDC can afford to buy the "sewer credits" they need, which basically amounts to paying for new sewers and treatment facilities outright.  For someone trying to grow a business or renovate apartments, it can be very difficult. 

 

A perfect example is Wild Ginger in Hyde Park.  After operating for a few years, the owner wanted to expand, and to do so she bought two adjacent properties.  The house next door had two or three apartments and was demolished for the expansion (as was the original house that formed the rear of the original restaurant), the one next to that had three apartments with an additional eight studio units off the back.  Those apartment units were a perfect way to get some affordable housing for the staff, and to augment the income of the restaurant.  That's the kind of thing you get with the more traditional apartments over store motif all over OTR.  However, even with underground water retention for the parking lot, waterless urinals, and drought tolerant plantings in the landscape, MSD wouldn't grant an expanded occupancy for the restaurant that would make the project worthwhile.  Either the owner would have to pay a huge fee (tens of thousands of dollars) to build some new sewer in who-knows-where, or more credits would have to be found by taking other uses off the system.  The only way in the end to do that was to demolish those eight studio apartments.  So unless you get some developer with deep pockets, you end up with a sort of zero-sum situation where increasing occupancy in one location requires taking that much away from somewhere else.  It's a really bad situation.

And we pay a lot of taxes to the city, and to the county which go to the city.

 

Who pays a lot of taxes to the city? Suburban residents? Or are you a city resident?

 

If you mean suburban residents, I wasn't aware of that. Can you explain?

 

Isn't there a payroll tax for Cincinnati?

 

Thank you Sherman.  Things that are obvious to some are completely missed by others.

 

All you had to say was "people who work in Cincinnati." Clearly not everyone works in the city, nor even a majority. Your generalization made it sound like there is some blanket transfer from the suburbs to the city, of which I was not aware, so I was just giving you the benefit of the doubt, politely.

I spend a lot of time traveling, especially in Pennsylvania.  During these trips I purchase goods and services and am charged Pennsylvania sales and hotel taxes.  Should I have a say in how Pennsylvania spends my money? 

^ Demurrer, welcome to the board!

Thanks.  I'm a long time lurker, but thought I might as well try to contribute a little as opposed to just mooch off your combined wisdom.

 

The Enquirer is a business that, in my opinion, delivers a crappy product.  i don't really care if they go under or not.

 

 

Be careful what you ask for. Having a local news publication with experienced journalists who are committed to doing research, analysis and honest-to-goodness reporting is one of the great assets of an open democracy. Many of these Internet-based news, radio and television reporters are nothing more than sounding boards, echo chambers and rip-and-read talking heads. If that is the future of journalism, then I am afraid.

 

I respect you, but I feel the 'newspapers are essential to democracy' is an incredibly maudlin conceit that says more about what reporters think about themselves than it describes reality.  It also doesn't explain why the paper was decent twenty years ago but blows now.  If the various industries that employed people can up and move to China and democracy can endure, I don't see why I can't import my news from The New York Times or Slate (yes, I realize they aren't local, but the paper's crappy local coverage is the precise reason I refuse to buy it.  Their reprinted AP stories are fine, if short.)

The paper 20 years ago had competition. It doesn't now and has little reason to improve. But I agree with KJP, many blogs are just soundboards or just repeats, offering little to no new content that can replicate what a newspaper can do, given that a newspaper has the resources and financial backing to produce more in-depth journalism that a blog or newsletter simply can't conduct. The Enquirer does several things well, and while we may bitch and moan about it being anti-streetcar, the newspaper serves a vital function that no one else in this city can -- financially and time-wise, duplicate.

 

When there were say, two newspapers, if one didn't like the Enquirer, they could just hop on over to the Kentucky-based Post for different viewpoints.

 

My main issue with blogs today is that they offer little engaging content and are often repeats from a newspaper, maybe with a zinger or two added in. I understand the desire of some to be strictly anti-Enquirer, going as far as to never visiting that site or reading that paper, but many of these pieces that are put out by bloggers were published by some print media hours or days ago.

 

I'm off on a tangent now.

I spend a lot of time traveling, especially in Pennsylvania.  During these trips I purchase goods and services and am charged Pennsylvania sales and hotel taxes.  Should I have a say in how Pennsylvania spends my money? 

 

if suburbanites want that much say about how Cincinnati spends money then move into the city so you can vote for the elected officials.

 

Exactly.  For the record, I don't live in the Cincinnati either, but I think the project is worthwhile.  Also, as Demurrer alluded to, once the taxes get paid, my money ceases to be "mine" and becomes the government's.  I've never quite understood why people don't get that.  If I make a purchase at Kroger, I don't feel that I have any say in what Kroger does with the money from that point forward.  The money has left my hand, so I really don't have a say in it.

Sales taxes and income taxes are not the same and shouldn't be looked at in the same light.

What do you propose, then, DanB? If you pay income tax in a municipality, should you get half a vote?

 

Why don't you tell your employer how you feel about political issues? They have influence proportional to the amount of money the business has invested into the local economy. Your influence in the company is proportional to how much they value you as a worker, which is also tied to your pay and hence the amount of income tax you pay. So there's your voice, neatly proportional to the tax burden you're so vocal about.

You just don't get it do you?

 

The point is, we work here and we care about the city, and we want our tax dollars used wisely as well as the people who live here.

Even if you weren't working in the city, you should care about the city. The health of the city is directly related to the health of your suburb.

 

My point is there is a democratic system in place to deal with people expressing their interests. If you want a bigger voice, then move to the city. Or start a movement for the city to annex your suburb. Or start a movement to make a powerful regional government.

the wisest thing you can do with any tax dollars is invest them in urban cores and in infrastructure that already exists.  its a bit of the pot calling the kettle black when you have suburbanites telling the City to use tax dollars wisely considering that most suburbs continue to build unnecessary infrastructure and demand more tax dollars to continue their increasingly unsustainable existance. 

Only because we need to get away from the mess that has occured in the city!

the wisest thing you can do with any tax dollars is invest them in urban cores and in infrastructure that already exists. its a bit of the pot calling the kettle black when you have suburbanites telling the City to use tax dollars wisely considering that most suburbs continue to build unnecessary infrastructure and demand more tax dollars to continue their increasingly unsustainable existance.

100% agree. By choosing to live in the suburbs, you are shirking certain responsibilities to the regional community. Fortunately, you working in the city helps to remedy this situation a bit. However, it's a trade-off you make, when you chose to live in the suburbs and remove yourself from many of the regional burdens carried by city residents, you lose the vote on city matters.

I never asked for a vote.  In what way am I shirking my responsibilities to the regional community?  That doesn't even make sense.  What regional burdens are being carried by the city residents moreso than I?

 

Don't minimize what non city residents do for the city.  We really get no benefits for those taxes, so the city should appreciate them more.  Maybe the county needs to revolt, and demand a county wide government and start dictating to the city residents to change?

Only because we need to get away from the mess that has occured in the city!

 

The townships are far from being perfect.  I lived in one for 27 years, and I have no desire to move back to one. 

And that's fine Melanie, I lived in the city too, and have no desire to move back.  We both may change our minds one day. 

I never asked for a vote.  In what way am I shirking my responsibilities to the regional community?  That doesn't even make sense.  What regional burdens are being carried by the city residents moreso than I?

 

The city houses the region's poor. We take on all the burdens and costs associated with policing them, educating them, putting out fires homeless people set, etc. We are stuck with all the old infrastructure which supports the city, hence supporting the whole region. We have to maintain the built environment, which is one of the region's greatest assets. Many city parents get stuck paying twice for schools (once public, once private), because available resources only sustain a few quality public schools.

 

Suburbanites bail out to their land of low taxes, with shiny new infrastructure built and maintained with state and federal subsidies. The few police on the force twiddle their thumbs between passing out revenue-generating tickets. Schooling is relatively cheap, without the inner-city challenges. Few problems with the sewers, road infrastructure Uncle Sam just bought for them, or old electric wires because it's not 200 years old.

 

Don't minimize what non city residents do for the city.  We really get no benefits for those taxes, so the city should appreciate them more. 

 

No benefits for those taxes? You get the city, without which your suburbs would be nothing. You get to not worry about poverty issues in your neck of the woods. You get a lot. A lot more than a city resident paying income tax to a suburb gets for his money.

 

Maybe the county needs to revolt, and demand a county wide government and start dictating to the city residents to change?

 

If you want a city-county merger, start the petition drive.

I respect you, but I feel the 'newspapers are essential to democracy' is an incredibly maudlin conceit that says more about what reporters think about themselves than it describes reality.

 

The Founding Fathers thought a free press was important enough to democracy that they included it in the first constitutional amendment they drafted. S'all I'm saying...

 

I know we have our issues with the Enquirer, but imagine if they only quoted the folks at COAST last year. That wouldn't have done much to inform the electorate prior to the streetcar vote.

A couple important things you get from the city, Dan:

 

Your suburb and your job.

 

If you don't feel you greatly benefit from the city, I honestly can't fathom why you come to this website. Unless you just want to troll, which I suppose is not that difficult to believe.

Sales taxes and income taxes are not the same and shouldn't be looked at in the same light.

 

How so?  It seems to me they are based on precisely the same jurisdictional nexus.  The theory is that one assents to a particular jurisdiction's tax laws when he or she either earns (in the case of income taxes) or spends (sales taxes) money within a particular jurisdiction's border.  By transacting business within a jurisdiction, the thinking is, one is taking advantage of the benefits and public services provided by the jurisdiction (e.g., roads, police, business development initiatives, etc.).  So unless we want to incentivize non-residents to become free riders, they must pay their share.  But I don't see how it necessarily follows that because a non-resident is subject to a particular jurisdiction's taxes, he or she should also have a say on how that jurisdiction uses the funds.

 

So why exactly do you think they are different?

There should be more than one viewpoint expressed here, otherwise it's not really a forum.  It becomes the back bumper of a Volvo.  I support every rail project I've ever heard of.  But I know that not everyone does, and I want to know why.  I want to know the nuts & bolts reasons, as well as the underlying philosophical reasons.  Some criticisms are more valid than others.  Discovering valid criticisms helps to strengthen the proposal and its pitch.  Of course, this process involves sorting through a lot of BS.  But I'm sure we've all heard the "legislative sausage" metaphor. 

There should be more than one viewpoint expressed here, otherwise it's not really a forum.  It becomes the back bumper of a Volvo.  I support every rail project I've ever heard of.  But I know that not everyone does, and I want to know why.  I want to know the nuts & bolts reasons, as well as the underlying philosophical reasons.  Some criticisms are more valid than others.  Discovering valid criticisms helps to strengthen the proposal and its pitch.  Of course, this process involves sorting through a lot of BS.  But I'm sure we've all heard the "legislative sausage" metaphor. 

 

Fine, but I'm not going to go regularly participate on a Christian forum just to be a contrarian all the time. Even though I do feel like people use Christianity to affect my life in a detrimental way.

  "My point is there is a democratic system in place"

 

  But it's not working. Sure, as Churchhill said, it's better than some other forms of government. But democracy often acts in counter-productive ways.

 

  We have shown a few examples of how the average person doesn't understand how government works. Yet the same person is making decisions at the polls. People literally don't know about what they are voting on.

 

    We have a candidate for county commissioner right now whose platform  touts himself as a "son of the suburbs" and brags that he "voted against the trolley." A City of Cincinnati councilman that is anti-city! That's democracy for you.

What we need is an enlightened despot. I nominate B. Hussein Obama.

 

  "Considering that most suburbs continue to build unnecessary infrastructure..."

 

  MSD and the City of Cincinnati water works are controlled by the city, and they have a suburban expansion policy! The City of Cincinnati is directly responsible for expansion into the suburbs - and the suburbs do not have the opportunity to vote on it. Why does Cincinnati do that?

 

    True Story:

 

    A representative of water works came to a City of Cincinnati council meeting to seek approval for expansion of the water system to Blue Jay. One of the council members expressed some concern that this expansion would contribute to urban sprawl, but council approved it anyway. After the issue was approved, one of the council members asked, "By the way, where is Blue Jay?"

 

    (Blue Jay is in western Hamilton County east of Harrison.)

 

    So, don't go blaming suburban folks exclusively on sprawl. Cincinnati could spend $120 million on a streetcar to bring development back to the city, but at the same time they spend as much to drive development out. Does that make any sense? When you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop digging.

A couple important things you get from the city, Dan:

 

Your suburb and your job.

 

If you don't feel you greatly benefit from the city, I honestly can't fathom why you come to this website. Unless you just want to troll, which I suppose is not that difficult to believe.

 

You clearly don't get it.  My job has multiple sites, and they can move the ones here in the city to other suburban cities both inside the county, and outside.  In fact, when I was paying city taxes to those other cities, I actually received a benefit from them other than the job. 

 

Do you have any idea what the county pays for those services you talk about?

 

Where did I ever say I didn't benefit from the city being here?  I just chose not to raise my kids within the city, because of the schools, resultant property values, and safety.  Others don't have the same concerns, and that is fine.

 

Now before you accuse me of just being a troll, I own property in 2 major cities in the state of Ohio, and I contribute to support this site.  How about you?

I respect you, but I feel the 'newspapers are essential to democracy' is an incredibly maudlin conceit that says more about what reporters think about themselves than it describes reality.

 

The Founding Fathers thought a free press was important enough to democracy that they included it in the first constitutional amendment they drafted. S'all I'm saying...

 

That's cute.  You've pretty much exhibited exactly the 'incredibly maudlin conceit that says more about what reporters think about themselves' that I mentioned with that statement.  I'm talking about the crappy local news reporting of one paper, and your bringing up the first amendment.

 

As a former reporter maybe you can describe why local news coverage tends to blow while local sports coverage maintains quality.  I always assumed that after The Enquirer got sued successfully by Chiquita or Lindner (I can't remember exactly who it was) ten or so years ago there's been a culture of timidity there, and that personnel cuts have reduced the wheat and left the chaff.

 

I know we have our issues with the Enquirer, but imagine if they only quoted the folks at COAST last year. That wouldn't have done much to inform the electorate prior to the streetcar vote.

 

I don't see what that has to do with The Enquirer not existing, which was what started this.  Anyway, I think The Enquirer is basically irrelevant as an opinion-former and opinion-leader, and is only becoming more so.

 

 

Where did I ever say I didn't benefit from the city being here?

We really get no benefits for those taxes, so the city should appreciate them more.

I debated Tom Luken on the subject of the streetcar yesterday.

 

Here was his closing statement: "When you eat a pork chop, who do you think wins -- you or the pork chop?"

 

Such are are the views of our loyal opposition.

^ I don't even understand that analogy.

^

Neither did anyone else in the audience.

Was this debate televised, recorded, and/or transcripts available?

I'll be using that pork chop line in conversation tomorrow.  Somehow, someway.

"People said I was dumb but I proved them!"

Was this debate televised, recorded, and/or transcripts available?

 

I hope so...I would imagine that wouldn't be the only soundbyte from Luken