Worcester Business Journal

wbjournal.com | November 21, 2016 | Worcester Business Journal 29 W Worcester's split tax rate doesn't add up The Worcester Business Journal welcomes letters to the editor and commentary submissions. Please send submissions to Brad Kane, editor, at bkane@wbjournal.com. W hat does this seem like to you? A receptionist who is 30 minutes late every day. A sales rep who struggles to stay awake during regular team meetings. A project manager who has missed three dead- lines and failed to fill in her timesheets two weeks in a row. Do they seem like problem employ- ees? Actually, they could be great employees doing their best to fulfill their responsibilities at work because they are simultaneously dealing with the noble, unpredictable and often overwhelming round-the-clock chal- lenge of caring for an older adult. They are not alone. An estimated 650,600 Massachusetts residents provide care to enable their spouses, parents, grandparents and other loved ones to continue living safely in their homes. Balancing a job with family caregiving responsibilities can be particularly difficult. Caregivers often have higher rates of absentee- ism, make more requests to leave early or come in late, and are more likely to cut back on hours, retire early or quit. They're also at higher risk for depression, diabetes, high cholesterol, hypertension, COPD, heart disease, kid- ney disease and stress. Any of these can have an impact on productivity, as well as a business' healthcare costs. Your company can help by being a resource for employees with caregiver responsibilities. Let them know about coordinated care programs that improve the quality of seniors' lives while reducing the strain on families. These government programs – called the Medicare Advantage Special Needs Plan (SNP) & Senior Care Options (SCO) as well as the Program of All- Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE) – provide benefits that exceed what is offered traditionally through Medicare and Medicaid and can make a significant difference for caregivers and their loved ones alike. Fallon's NaviCare (SNP and SCO) and Summit ElderCare (PACE) programs offer the covered Medicare and Medicaid benefits plus: • Personalized medical care plan with a dedicated team • Coordinated care with a centralized medical record • Transportation to and from medical appointments • Rides to social activities like family events and church • Assistance with bathing, dressing and home meal preparation • Adult day health program providing recreation and socialization These are just some of the additional benefits that have the potential to relieve some of the stress on caregivers. The principles behind these programs are the same: keep seniors healthy and living as independently as possi- ble in the community and share the care with caregivers. This provides tremendous peace of mind, so caregivers don't neglect their health, work and family responsibilities. It continues to surprise me that these plans are not more broadly known and therefore underutilized. Only one-in-three eligible Massachusetts residents is taking advantage of a SCO, SNP or PACE plan. We can begin to change this by creating awareness among employees, care- givers and medical providers. November is National Family Caregivers Month. Let's remember to recognize all loving caregivers – in our com- munities and workplaces – and raise awareness of the pro- grams that provide them and their loved ones with the support they need. Kristine Bostek is vice president for senior care services at Fallon Health in Worcester. When caregiving affects work A few weeks before the Worcester City Council goes into its annual exercise of setting the property tax rates, the Worcester Regional Research Bureau released a report in mid-November detailing the pitfalls of the city's split rates for resi- dential and commercial payors, a system first intro- duced in 1984 as a response to Proposition 2 ½. The report "Tax Classification: Passing the Buck$" makes a strong case for a single tax rate. • Commercial and industrial property owners con- tribute a significantly disproportionate amount of the city's taxes, paying for 39 percent of tax revenues while accounting for only 29 percent of tax value. • That split rate has made Worcester a less attrac- tive community to operate a business, and more businesses have left and fewer have come into the city (tax-paying commercial and industrial proper- ties decreased from 3,959 in 1992 to 3,421 in 2016), so the tax burden is spread out among fewer enti- ties. Today the average annual tax payment for a commercial property owner is $30,513, the highest among Worcester and its border communities. • This reduction in the number of businesses to shoulder the tax burden has left residential proper- ty owners to cover a larger portion of the tax reve- nues. The portion of tax revenues coming from them rose from 55 percent in 1984 to 60 percent in 2016, with the peak at 69 percent in 2011. • Over the last few decades the city's top indus- tries have switched from manufacturing to health care and higher education, which have higher bar- riers to entry-level positions and lower average annual salaries ($74,642 vs. $53,490). • Organizations in the higher education and healthcare industries are typically nonprofits, meaning they contribute nothing, or in some cases a small payment in lieu of taxes, to the city coffers. The value of tax-exempt property in Worcester more than doubled in the last 13 years, going from $2 billion in 2003 to over $5 billion in 2016. The WRRB report notes the political reality that has keep the split tax rate alive - there are more resi- dents voting than there are commercial property owners, making it an easy populist position for city councilors to vote for the lowest residential tax rate. While progress toward a single rate has been made, it has been a hard fought and difficult to sustain. After four years of narrowing the gap, the council went the other way last year and approved an increase that widened the difference. Today the resi- dential tax rate is $20.61 per $1,000, while commer- cial and industrial ticked up to $33.98 per $1,000. The city's business community, led by the Worcester Regional Chamber of Commerce, makes its annual appeal for the narrowing of the two rates. Last year, those arguments went unheeded. However, something in the air seems to be changing in Worcester. Development is active in the downtown area, and years of investment are paying off in large scale and small scale commercial investments. There seems to be a deeper under- standing that if this current boom is to be sus- tained, it will take a much more welcoming approach to commercial investment. Not every property owner can qualify for tax breaks or other incentives to make their project go. A sustained reduction of the debilitatingly high commercial tax rate needs to become part of that formula for suc- cess. True commercial expansion now seems a real possibility, but without that commitment to make the commercial tax rate more fair, the city risks los- ing the current momentum and limiting the num- ber of investors willing to take a risk in Worcester. We hope last year's vote that widened the tax gap was an aberration, and that the city council will commit to a sustained plan to narrow the gap, and eventually return to a single rate system. V I E W P O I N T E D I T O R I A L WO R D F R O M T H E W E B BY KRISTINE BOSTEK Special to the Worcester Business Journal Kristine Bostek W Comment of the issue "I have a novel idea. How about we build a road to the airport from 290 so that people can actually find it efficiently?" - Anonymous commenter, Nov. 8, on a poll asking whether readers have used the Worcester Regional Airport Tweets of the week "For the record, we make great baseball in Central Massachusetts too." -Worc. Bravehearts (@WooBaseball) Nov. 5, on WBJ's new publication, A Guide to STUFF Made in Central Massachusetts "That's just insane. Are we supposed to just keep dumping cash into this place?" - Black Rides Matter (@okie1011) Nov. 14, on the $6 million needed to repair Union Station in Worcester W WBJ Facebook feedback "Awesome. There's an urgent care clinic across the street." - Marie Christine, Nov. 3, on Simon Malls scrapping plans for a movie theater and restau- rant in the Auburn Mall in favor of a two-story medical facility

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