Article Contributed on: 7/1/2009 12:47:49 AM
You've worked your whole life, you die, your family tries to sell off some stuff for whatever reason (pay off debts, pay for your funeral, etc) and the taxman, or taxwoman in this case (Longmont City Councilmember
Sarah Levison) follows you to and beyond the grave to collect.
Apparently someone in town was holding an "estate sale" and Ms. Levison wants the city to get its fair share of sales tax revenue from this sale. She "
had an occasion to stop by" this sale, said she didn't buy any of the $500+ items, and has now turned snitch on the people holding it. I'm sure it will greatly help in the grieving process.
She said she "noticed they were not collecting taxes for the City of Longmont". She's either clairvoyant or actually asked them, but she didn't elude to that in her comments. How does she know they weren't collecting sales tax for Longmont or the State of Colorado? That's right, she doesn't. Don't you love those kind of people who show up at places (usually uninvited as anyone who knows them would just assume not invite them to anything) and start throwing their weight and opinion around? In this case a city councilmember making assumptions (correct or not) about a possibly criminal activity, in her opinion.
She didn't say she
didn't buy anything. So if she did, was she a known accessory to tax evasion? We'll leave that alone, for now...
Here's the video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cet_FI3K1j0
Once again, with some people their instincts and principles just come natural in social settings - in this case a nosey, overtaxing nanny-state type. It's not enough that they want to bring back the "Death Tax" ("Estate tax" is just too nice) and tax you your whole life and into the afterlife spreading their misery to those you leave behind. But tax them again when they try to sell your stuff, probably just to keep the house you lived in and paid a mortgage on for years.
But that's not all! She also wants to find out if maybe the state could go after these people, she'd "
hate to think that we might have lost several hundred dollars worth of tax income that day". She ended with "
we need every dime we can get these days". First off, "
we" being the government, is supposed to be
us, the people. It's amazing how quickly elected officials forget that and find as many ways as possible to siphon off money from citizens.
Second, if this city didn't squander money away so frivolously in the last 18 months (about the same time as this weak majority has been on council - no,
precisely the time this weak majority has been in charge) this wouldn't be so much of an issue. It was Ms. Levison in particular who led the charge with last minute adjustments to the recent budget, things dreamed up on the fly with no public notice.
You must know where this is leading, get ready for....
GARAGE SALES TAX.
...and your future garage sale monitor and elected busybody, Sarah Levison, At-Large Longmont City Councilmember.
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