Wheel tax again
Looks like Blount County is taking another stab at passing a wheel tax:
Homemade signs, honking horns and a standing-room-only crowd at the Blount County Commission meeting Thursday could not kill the wheel tax.
Commissioners voted 11-9 to refer it to the Financial Management Committee, “where it should have gone to begin with,” said Commissioner Donna Dowdy.
A wheel tax, which failed in December and again in February, was back on the commission’s agenda this month, though there was no corresponding resolution setting an amount or a designation for revenues.
Despite the ambiguity — or perhaps because of it — the wheel tax sparked a rally from the anti-tax group Citizens for Blount County’s Future. About 20 tax foes staked out points around the courthouse for an hour prior to the commission meeting, encouraging other tax opponents to honk horns in protest of a wheel tax. One wore a bumper sticker proclaiming Blount County “the most crooked little county in the South.”
