Stitch and Taxes

Dr. Tennant’s office brought us another experience when Sam was three or four years old. We had bought a new mattress and it was delivered one evening as we were leaving for some event or other. We just left it sitting on the living room floor and planned to put it in place the next morning since we would be coming home late.

As was his custom (like when he wandered over to Catherine and Jim’s) Sam woke up early and found that brand new mattress in the living room. It was a great place to jump up and down but at his age he was unable to control his movement. Consequently, he bounced too high, tumbled off the mattress and hit his head on a piece of furniture.

The loud cries woke us up and we found Sam with a gash in his forehead. We called Dr. Tennant at home, since it was before regular hours, and he told us to meet him at the office.

The office was stuffy on a hot summer day and Doc told Janice she better wait outside and let me act as a nurse because he thought she might not be able to handle the blood under those conditions.

So, macho Dad held on to Sam while Doc put some stitches in Sam’s head. It wasn’t long before the room began to move and I told the good doctor I had better join Janice outside.

By that time, Sam had calmed down and was handling the situation a lot better than his parents. When we came back he was ready to go and he said, “Dr. Tennant, where’s my sucker?” He had been there before and knew it was standard procedure for kids to get a sucker on their way out.

My inexperience, not only in the newspaper business but in many phases of life, showed up quite frequently. Some I handled well, some I didn’t.

At that time, Nebraska had a personal property tax and businesses had to list equipment and place a value on it. The first time I had to fill out the forms, I simply used the figures of my predecessor from the previous year.

The county commissioners called me in to justify my figures. After a while in their board of equalization room, I found out my competitor in the little town of Pilger had complained my figures were too low. One of the commissioners was from Pilger and he was not backing down no matter how justified my argument appeared.

They knew absolutely nothing about the value of printing equipment but reasoned that since the Register had three times the circulation of the Pilger paper our equipment would have to be more and higher priced. That was not true, of course, since the same printing press, for example, could print either 500 or 1500 copies quite easily.

What it all boiled down to was one politician’s position with his constituent. When I found out the difference in tax based on my valuation and what they proposed was only a few dollars, I figured it wasn’t worth antagonizing the other two commissioners so I relented.

Another factor involved in the commissioners’ attitude probably was the story I carried in the paper concerning their setting of the mill levy that year.

The state legislature had decreed that valuations should be at 35 per cent of actual value instead of what it had been in previous years. I have no clue as to why this figure was chosen since it really doesn’t matter. Levies are set based on tax requirements of the various county subdivisions. Assuming the same money requirements, the levy would go down with increased valuations and up with decreased totals.

After years of writing stories about Nebraska taxes, I understand this principal very clearly. At that time, however, I did not. Consequently, when the commissioners set their levy on the reduced 35 per cent mark, it required a higher levy but did not raise substantially more money.

My headline did not reflect the true picture when it stated “Commissioners Double Taxes in Stanton County.” I got a number of calls about that and it is no wonder the commissioners called me to task on my property tax filing.