THURSDAY, JUNE 26, 2008
VOL. 13 NO. 10
State hospital tax ‘bad policy’
NEWS HEADLINES
Laurel Fourth of July Section
By Lynn R. Parks
Inside this Edition
BUDGET - The Seaford budget is balanced, but is razor thin and includes some increases in fees and borrows from the reserve fund. Page 4 INVISTA - An accord, which will allow the company and the federal agency to share safety information, includes the Seaford nylon plant. Page 5 NEW FURNITURE STORE - Wheaton’s in Seaford will sell solid wood furniture that is made in North America. Page 6 VETERANS - His survival after being shot down is more exciting than a James Bond episode. Page 8 NEW PIZZARIA - Hungry Howie’s restaurant is the first on Delmarva. Page 15 FISH COMEBACK - The state releases more than half a million shad fry in the Nanticoke River. This is the eighth year of the fishery restoration project. Page 49 BLUE-GOLD - Local representatives took part in the annual Blue-Gold all-star football game last weekend in Newark. The game benefits people with intellectual disabilities. Page 41 ALL-STARS - The 9 and 10 year-old softball and baseball all-stars began play this week. See photos and scores beginning on page 41.
INSIDE THE STAR AUTO ALLEY BUSINESS BULLETIN BOARD CHURCH CLASSIFIEDS EDUCATION ENTERTAINMENT FINAL WORD FRANK CALIO GOURMET HEALTH LETTERS LYNN PARKS MIKE MCCLURE
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MOVIES 7 OBITUARIES 24 37 ON THE RECORD 54 OPINION 21 PAT MURPHY PEOPLE 40 POLICE JOURNAL 38 PUZZLES 37 SNAPSHOTS 52 SPORTS 41-47 TIDES 7 TODD CROFFORD 51 TONY WINDSOR 39 VETERANS OF WWII 8
RIVERFEST SURVIVORS - From left, Mayor Ed Butler, Councilwoman Pat Jones and city manager Dolores Slatcher show off the new Riverfest 2008 T-shirt at the end of the Seaford City Council meeting Tuesday night. The theme of this year's Riverfest, which will be held in downtown Seaford July 10 through 12, is “Survivor.” During the council meeting, Butler promised some exciting games for the traditional mayor's challenge. More on Riverfest on page 28. Photo by Lynn R. Parks
20 property owners will get refunds totaling $217,000 By Lynn R. Parks At last, the city of Seaford’s long struggle to solve problems caused by a 2004 “audit” of city property values seems to have come to an end. Tuesday night, the city council agreed unanimously with city manager Dolores Slatcher’s recommendation that $217,446 be refunded to 20 property owners who were overcharged based on the findings of the audit. The city will not refund money to 17 other property owners who protested the findings of the audit. The refund will come out of the city’s reserve accounts. All 37 appeals have been pending the results of a formal reassessment of city property. That reassessment, conducted by Delaware-licensed real estate appraiser David R. Hickey, was completed earlier this year. Slatcher acknowledged during the city council meeting that the city’s earlier efforts to update its assessment roles “could have been handled differently.” She added that the recently-completed reassessment has
resolved many of the disputes that were caused by the audit. In 2004, the city hired Randy Westergren, Milford, to conduct what he called an audit of values of property throughout the city. In December of that year, Westergren told the city council that he had identified 899 properties, about a third of those in the city, whose owners were paying taxes based on assessments that were too low. The city was losing $246,526 every year in tax revenue, he said. The city council voted to retroactively bill owners of those properties additional amounts for the 20042005 fiscal year, based on Westergren’s values. Tax bills that have gone out since have also been based on those values. Shortly after that decision, Larry Moynihan, a certified real estate appraiser and owner of Tidewater Properties, Seaford, sent two letters to the city, indicating that the procedure Westergren used in the assessment audit was illegal and that Westergren did not have the proper
A state proposal to tax hospital receipts is simply “bad policy,” said Mark Rappaport, chief executive officer of Nanticoke Memorial Hospital, Seaford. The tax could spell the end of Nanticoke’s anticipated $1 million surplus next year, added chief financial officer Darr Hall. This for a hospital that has been struggling to get any kind of surplus: In the last two years, it has posted a loss. “This tax is not in our budget” for fiscal year 2009, said Hall. “Our $1 million surplus could turn into a loss of $1 million, or $2 million.” Representatives of Nanticoke were expected to be among hospital personnel attending a rally at Legislative Hall Wednesday, to protest the proposed tax. A decision on the tax will be part of the final state budget, which has to be approved by July 1. The state has proposed the tax as part of its efforts to overcome a $217 million revenue shortfall. As proposed, the tax would charge hospitals 2.9 percent on their net patient revenue, or the amount that the hospitals expect to receive in return for care that they provide. “They would tax us on what we expect to receive,” Rappaport said. Not taken into account, he added, would be the bad debts — 5 to 6 percent, in Nanticoke’s case — that hospitals have to absorb. “In theory, we would be taxed on what we collect, but also on what we Continued to page three
Seaford approves gas pipeline By Lynn R. Parks The Seaford City Council Tuesday night gave its final OK for the installation of a pipeline through downtown to feed natural gas to the Invista nylon plant. The new 8,500-foot pipeline will travel to the plant from the Eastern Shore Natural Gas pumping station on the Nanticoke River at Water Street via Market Street, Poplar Street, the railroad right-of-way, Harrington Street and No Name Road. In return for its granting the rightsof-way to Eastern Shore Natural Gas, Invista will pay the city an initial fee of $25,000. It will continue to pay an annual fee of $25,000, increased by three percent per year. Initially, the money will go into the city’s reserve accounts, Continued to page four