LINDEN HOLLOW, Ohio — The Linden Hollow Budget Committee voted 5-0 Thursday night to cut the town’s property tax rate to zero and approve $4.2 million in new spending, closing the gap between the two with a line item the committee’s clerk entered as “Confidence.”
Resolution 26-52, which passed in 11 minutes during a regular meeting at which all five members were present, sets the town’s property tax rate at 0.000 mills effective Jan. 1. The same resolution funds a $1.4 million fountain for the village green, a $1.1 million “Heritage Parade,” a gold-leaf roof for the town hall at a cost of $900,000, and an $800,000 “Committee on Efficiency,” which will meet monthly in a conference room the town does not own.
“We cut the taxes because taxes are theft. We built the fountain because the fountain is not,” said Committee Chair Dwayne Ostrowski, 63. “I have been saying for 30 years that the government should spend less, and I stand by it. That is why every dollar in this budget is a necessary dollar. I would also like to point out that it is a lot of dollars.”
Asked how the town would pay for the spending without taxes, Ostrowski said the budget would be balanced by Line 14, which the clerk, Joyce Pfeiffer, listed as “Confidence, $4.2 million.” Pfeiffer said the entry had been “carried forward from last year, when we also had it, and we are still here.”
Ostrowski said the revenue was “real” because the committee believes in it. “People say you can’t count something you can’t see. I say they’ve never seen a budget,” he said. “We’re confident the money is coming. We’re so confident that we’ve already spent it, twice, which is how you know.”
The Reporter’s data desk compared the town’s plan to the federal budget. The Congressional Budget Office estimated this week that for the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, federal spending rose about 6 percent and revenue rose about 3 percent, leaving a deficit of roughly $2.0 trillion, about $218 billion more than the year before. Linden Hollow’s plan produces a deficit of 100 percent of spending, which committee members said was “ambitious, but local.”
“We did not invent this approach,” said Councilman Walt Dreyer, 58. “We are following a model.”
Dr. Marjorie Teller, director of the Center for Measured Outcomes, said the Center was unable to locate the confidence. “The line item totals $4.2 million, and we searched the clerk’s office, the fire hall, and the committee members’ coat pockets and found $0.00,” Teller said. “The committee is nonetheless correct that it is present. Further study is needed.”
Dr. Chad Brickhouse, a senior fellow at the Institute for Common Sense, said the plan followed from first principles. “Spending is just revenue you haven’t been billed for yet,” Brickhouse said by phone from a hardware store. “It’s just common sense. You can’t have the fountain without the fountain. You can have the fountain without the bill.”
The committee also approved a resolution recommending that residents “pay what feels right.” The first payment, $11 in cash, was left in a coffee can on the clerk’s desk Friday morning. It has been entered as Confidence.