Back in 2007, the NC Association of County Commissioners begged the legislature for the right to let their citizens vote on a local option real estate transfer tax. The counties said then that “the people should have the right to decide”. The General Assembly went along with that request. Since then, voters in 23 counties have said “NO” to that idea by a cumulative margin of 3 to 1. The scoreboard now reads 23-0 in favor of the taxpayers.
So now the counties have changed their tune. They want to be able to have a transfer tax WITHOUT voter approval. The NC Association of County Commissioners met December 10 and (as detailed on their Web site) adopted the following as their priority goal for the 2009 legislative session:
The priority goal seeks legislation "to allow all counties to enact by resolution any or all revenue options from among those that have been authorized for any other county, including local option sales taxes, impact taxes, real estate transfer taxes and prepared food taxes, and to preserve the existing local revenue base."
You can go to www.ncacc.org for more information.