dsewell writes: According to mayor David Brown, lower Blue Book values for used cars translates into lower tax revenues for the city. I don’t get it. “Brown says used cars are flooding the market because people are buying a lot of new cars with all the incentives out there.” So if people are buying new cars, shouldn’t the higher assessments on them offset the lower values on used cars? Or are people buying new cars everywhere but in C’ville?
Perhaps that commercial about cars being cheaper in the country is having its impact? ;)
the new apartments & homes that have come on the market and the increase in the value of homes would more than make up anything lost in lower used car values. The mayor is asking you to believe that the pennies the city is losing in car taxes is more important than the buckets of dollars they are making on new homes and higher property taxes.
So glad to see someone else caught that absence of logic. I bought my new car in the county. I just paid city taxes in Dec. My used car is sitting in the lot in the county, not in the city.
Are there any city car dealers left?
His comment made no sense, not to mention compound the car tax on our new cars with the huge increase in property taxes. The city should be rolling in the money, perhaps not enough to pay someone over $166,00o to spend the year on "sick" leave.
While we’re on the subject of vehicles, I would like to see somebody do a current survey on "take-home" vehicles issued to city employees. How many? How far do they travel? What guidelines are in place as to how the vehicles may be used while off-duty? I for one am extremely upset after repeatedly seeing a department head drive a city vehicle to their part time employment in the evening. The taxpayers are paying for the car and the gasoline. During December I saw one employee Christmas shopping in a car I know to be owned by the City of Charlottesville even though it had plain license plates on it (as opposed to Public Use license plates). In another case a city employee was at a steak restaurant for hours in a city vehicle while consuming what appeared to be alcoholic beverages. This is why our taxes are out of control. The employees come and go in city vehicles 24 hours a day, while we the taxpayers foot the bills. Is the use of these vehicles once again out of control? And how did the City Manager let it get out of control again?
Perhaps everyone is driving a Dodge! The book value on Dodge autos is sickening.
The "dodge" is keeping your car registered in a state that doesn’t collect personal property taxes on cars.
Most of the people I know don’t even shop for new vehicles in Charlottesville simply because the Brown autogroup "Monopoly" and the unwillingness to work with a potential customer when attempting to purchase. Many of the surrounding cities who have dealerships selling the same auto’s do offer the incentive plans and are willing to negotiate prices. I was once told by a salesman "That’s the price, if you don’t like it go somewhere else" so I did. I went to Richmond and purchased my vehicle and paid almost $2k less than the sticker in Charlottesville (including incentives). Another thing I’ve noticed is that when service flyers are mailed from other dealerships outside Charlotteseville, their pricing on the service package is significantly lower than Brown. So, I don’t mind paying $10 in gas to drive 45 minutes and save $90 which translates how much I saved when I purchased the vehicle. Unless the Charlottesville auto market becomes competitive with out of the area dealerships, I will continue to purchase vehicles from other localities.