Thank You, Dover City Council!

Without your arrogance and proclivity towards building Dover city government at all costs and at the expense of overburdened taxpayers, Dover resident Dave Scott would never have been elected to fill one of your seats.

You sure showed Dave who was boss by withholding what any taxpayer knows were public documents when you refused to show him what city employees are paid. Please, now that you have so much free time on your hands hire yourselves out as consultants to other bloated city councils.

The interesting part is how you lost several seats at once so you will not be able to marginalize Mr. Scott (And I suggest you call him “Mr. Scott” from now on as well.)

The Coalition of NH Taxpayers has offered City Councilor-elect Dave Scott our congratulations and help.

Ed Naile, Chair, CNHT
www.nhtaxpayerradio.com

Interesting Manchester Mayoral Race

Alderman Frank Guinta bested three-term Manchester Mayor Bob Baines Tuesday with an anti-tax message (the one most liberals say never works) topped off with a tough-on-crime promise.

Both candidates had outside help from the usual cadre of primary-interested members of their own party but Baines had the support of Governor Not Benson. That may come as a shocker to him and a sign of weakness by potential gubernatorial candidates from any party. After all, Mayor Baines was one of the top office holding Democrats in the state next to the RINOs on the executive Council and House leadership.

Our taxpayer group, The Coalition of NH Taxpayers, will be interested even more in the next election in two years now that the spending cap was kept from the Manchester voters by the nit-picking of wording in the cap by the Secretary of State and AG's office. This trick failed in Laconia where the city council placed a revised cap on the ballot - which passed.

By causing the cap to be sent off to Superior Court where it was held up until after the time it could get back on the ballot, voters were denied a chance to make a tangible statement regarding Manchester spending. This clever trick worked wonders in killing the cap, a move that may have been contrived to keep voter turnout down. But it only served to delay the inevitable.

Mayor Baines showed himself to be a real quality guy in coming to Guinta's victory party to concede the election. It is a small city and this is a good move in getting the new team in place. Maybe the Republicans in Manchester can be so kind to each other for a while and help Frank Guinta with his new job.

Ed Naile, Chair CNHT
www.nhtaxpayerradio.com

Oh Dear, Scooter's Indicted And The World Stands Still

Only in Washington could Scooter Libbey being indicted on charges of lying to some members of the press and one sloppy prosecutor be considered a victory for the left. If this is what the Dems. are running on they better get fresh paddles for bleep creek.

Columnist Jim Pinkerton in a recent piece exposed what has got to be one of the most heartening facts involving this CIA non-leak scandal besides Ambassador Wilson being a lying drama queen of epic proportions.

Mr. Scooter, before he became an adviser to Vice President Dick Cheney, was a lawyer for Marc Rich, as in very very rich! Remember Marc?

Marc Rich was, and still is, the Iraq oil for food billionaire former President William Rodham Clinton pardoned in the last days of his administration as he and Princess Hillary were crating up the White House furniture.

As a conservative I am now in hog heaven. I just finished a book recently on Rich's life up to early 2000. International metals and oil trader Marc Rich is responsible for hundreds of millions of dollars in unpaid US income taxes and for a sizable chunk of our current gasoline prices.

So what's it gonna be boys, hard time for Scooter or a pardon like the one his boss Marc got as his wife Denise shoveled almost a half million into the Clinton coffers. Either way I am left with a warm and fuzzy feeling.

Let's have a trial, time it for the 2006 races, put Joe Wilson on the stand and ask these questions:

1. Remember Mr. Wilson you are under oath. Have you ever told anyone other than immediate family that your wife was a covert CIA agent?
2. Wasn't the March 8, 2002 intelligence report on your excursion to Niger written so as to protect your identity as per an agreement with the DOI?
3. How did you come to see classified US Intelligence documents you described to reporters upon your return from Niger.
4. Mr. Wilson, didn't former Nigerian Prime Minister Ibrahim Mayaki tell you on or about Feb. 27, 2002 that he had been approached 18 months before your visit by an Iraqi delegation, one of who's purposes was to buy yellow-cake uranium?
5. Isn't it true Mr. Wilson that on February 18, 2002 there was reported a 1000 ton difference between what the French mining consortium's in Niger report they mined and what the government of Niger reports it sold?
6. Is the the following statement from the DOI report filed after your fact-finding trip a truthful reflection of what occurred on your trip to Niger: “On February 26, 2002, the former ambassador arrived in Niger. He told Committee staff that he first met with Ambassador Owens-Kirkpatrick to discuss his upcoming meetings. Ambassador Owens-Kirkpatrick asked him not to meet with current Nigerian officials because she believed it might complicate her continuing diplomatic efforts with them on the uranium issue. The former ambassador agreed to restrict his meetings to former officials and the private sector.”
7. Mr. Wilson, didn't you really cook up a scheme to travel to Niger with the use of your wife's position as an analyst with the CIA to discredit the Bush Administration, and didn't you conspire with your wife to lie about what you found?

So Democrats. Please make this Wilson character and Scooter your poster boys for a Hillary for President campaign.

Ed Naile, Chair CNHT
www.nhtaxpayerradio.com

If You Don't Like The View Tax Assessment You'll Hate How It Was Created

Picture a small circle of people who have the power of the legislature without the veto of the Governor and you have the NH Assessing Standards Board. They are the good people who created the View Assessment, or in other words, the View Tax.

The View Tax was created during the birth of the statewide property tax scam and it flourished with the tender loving care of State Representative Betsy Patten, guardian of all that is larger municipal government.

We have always had a “view tax” but it was part of an overall assessed value of your property. Just as some properties have privacy or seclusion as a selling point, views have value. Here is the problem in layman's terms.

The Assessing Standards Board is made up of up to 15 individuals selected through a process laid out in RSA 21-J14-a, the DRA statute. It is filled with people who have interests in assessing property, the most prominent member being one Gary Roberge of the state's largest assessing firm, Avitar.

If your town isn't being assessed by Avitar, over 100 are, it is probably being assessed with Avitar software.

Four members of the Assessing Standards Board are, coincidentally, selected by the NH Association of Assessing Officials as per 21-J14-a, II.

If you haven't guessed already, these two board share common interests as well as members. One of the most prominent members is – you guessed it, Garry Roberge of Avitar.

In that capacity Mr. Robarge is able to draft the laws regarding all assessing in New Hampshire and apply them to himself and his software.

Nice deal for Avitar. Bad deal for taxpayers!

This means the average taxpayer must be able to debate the Avitar/Patten/Lynch view tax
by being able to counter the ridicules View Assessment Manuals Avitar creates in each town. Except for instance in cities with high-rise apartments. They seem to have been spared the view assessment, but anyone knows a view is part of the package.

Oh I said LYNCH view tax. That was not a mistake. “Governor Not Benson” just nominated Roberge for another term on the Assessing Standards Board but as often happens Governor Not Benson could not make up his mind when the going got hot, as in lots of pressure from taxpayers furious at the view Assessment to get rid of Roberge, so our Governor let the NH Association of Assessing Officials reappoint Roberge. Nice move.

Back to the Avitar/Patten/Lynch View Tax.

Now this Avitar Assessing Manual for Views is a hoot. They take a few pictures around town of what might be considered typical views. They categorize them and assign them values. This is almost laughable.

Instead of using sales to determine the worth of a view on any given property, street, or neighborhood as we do with everything else with a value as high as the Avitar/Patten/Lynch View Tax, taxpayers now have to fight an unfair reassessment with a formula created out of a book of photos. At least with lake frontage assessment you have a per foot measurement to start with and everyone is on the same body of water. Not so the view tax.

In July of 2004 I started asking the Town of Deering where I, unfortunately for them, reside for the assessing manual Avitar is supposed to supply to us during our new reassessment according to Administrative Rule 600 (another non-legislative law). “Not public” I was told.

So off to Hillsborough Superior I went with a Right-to-Know case and the day before our hearing the Town surrendered the 109 page manual made by Avitar. It had the wholly subjective “Deering View Assessment Manual” included.

What was not, and as of today as far as I know, still not included in the contentious manual was the basic data Avitar was supposed to use to set values to property in town. This data is required by statute and there is no way of knowing how Avitar came up with property values without that data.

But we got that View Assessment book alright. My question is, would the View Assessment Book be as incomplete and incomprehensible as the Assessing Manual pawned off in my town.

Conclusion:

Make sure your selectmen are aware of what is going on in other towns and are looking out for the taxpayers in your town, not the assessing officials. Get informed and stand up for yourself. Don't let the performance bond go until the assessing firm has completed a satisfactory job which complies with the law.

Ed Naile, Chair CNHT
www.nhtaxpayerradio.com

Out Of My Ivy League!

Sorry readers. I missed Part II Article II of the US Constitution during my first read but upon further review, and I apologize again, as it clearly states in part as follows:

The president shall have the power to appoint members to the Supreme Court with the advice and consent of any interest group able to force a nominee to withdraw before a hearing can be held on said nominee......

So the check and balance in this case is the threat of having your name dragged through the mud, family ridiculed, credit and loan records revealed and video rental history made public – before the nominee can respond at a Senate hearing - just as the founders intended.

The follow-up check on the Executive branch is the added protection of the nominee absolutely having to have an Ivy League education so that “conservative” commentators and Senators have cover to support a liberal when the time comes, as it more often than not does.

Ed Naile, Chair CNHT
http://www.nhtaxpayerradio.com/