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RAISING MONEY FOR YOUR ASSETS How much say do you have in the funding and running of community and civic assets in your town or city? In countries with a high degree of fiscal (tax) centralization such as the U.K., cuts and closures to local government community and civic assets are often due to cuts in the national income tax take that is allocated to local government. If you want to see voters in your community and city having various tax-related mechanisms through which, if they want, they can support assets, then the United States offers several informative models. Whilst the U.S. case study cities and states have not entirely escaped austerity measures, they do have a range of mechanisms that allow them to raise their own tax money for assets. More importantly, these mechanisms are often voted for by the public, so local taxpayers have to engage with the question of whether they want assets and whether they want them enough to pay for them. This section begins by outlining these mechanisms and then proceeds to look at a wider range of additional funding sources including: • public sector efficiency drives and use of fees/charges (useful for those who oversee local governmentfunded community and civic assets); • donations by the public and fund-raising drives by non-profits (useful for asset supporter groups); • foundation grants (mainly useful for foundations and the non-profits which apply to them); and • donations and gifts-in-kind from local businesses (useful for corporate social responsibility managers and those looking for corporate support with their community and civic assets). You will see here that, even if local taxpayers were able to finance local assets, there are many benefits from funding a share of the costs from foundations, business, philanthropy and individual donations. Your state or city can use a range of tax mechanisms to sustain assets State and city governments have typically raised money for assets through some combination of taxes (Table 3.1). The table outlines specific examples of assets funded or, in a few cases, to the types of assets that receive support. One of the striking aspects of the menu is the extent to which they often involve voter approval. This is important because it gives individuals a mechanism to give to assets, and because the debates that accompany such votes raise awareness about assets. 32 The ability to use different types of taxes does of course also lessen the reliance upon any one type. 32 The property tax for the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board is not voted on but elections to the board itself are vigorously contested, so the exact size of the levy (over which the board has some leeway) remains in the public eye. 67 | The New Barn-Raising
Table 3.1: Taxes used to raise funds for assets Tax on… Example Examples of support for assets Things you own Things you buy Property Tax (permanent) Millage Property Taxes 33 (Michigan-specific. Voter approved, time-limited, and for specific initiatives) Special Assessment Districts (voter-approved property taxes that pay for additional services) Fiscal Disparity Law (uses growth in the metro-wide business property tax base to help needier areas and encourage open space) Sales Tax for certain goods and services (voter approved on retail and certain sale of certain services) Real Estate Sales Tax (0.5 percent on every transaction in the state. Rises in line with property price sales so as development pressure grows so do their finances) • Minneapolis Park and Recreation system • Minneapolis Institute of Arts • Detroit Institute of Arts, Public Library system, and Zoological Authority all have separate millage funding • Huron Clinton Metro-parks Authority • Troy Public Library • Four clusters of neighborhoods, often including business areas, in Baltimore • Spending is on supplementary sanitation and community-based safety services. Also supports and organizes community activities and assets • This helps areas in the Twin Cities with a low business property tax base • One of the benefits is that it encourages areas to keep/ accept open space (such as state parks) that do not generate property tax revenue 34 • Minnesota’s Legacy Amendment (referred to in the Raising Awareness section) • Loans and grants for Neighborhood STAR and Cultural STAR programs 35 in St. Paul • Funding for library hours at Hennepin County Library (up to $2 million a year) and youth sports and activities. 36 • In Buncombe County, North Carolina, proceeds from a hotel room tax are used for marketing the area and for new civic assets that would generate additional hotel stays • In Baltimore city, the state-funded Program Open Space 37 has been used to restore and build new rec and parks facilities, but for capital projects rather than much-needed revenue spend 38 Things you earn Income Tax (Permanent, although rates vary. Mainly at the state level although there are local income taxes too 39 ) • The research that underpins the toolkit did not uncover specific examples of assets whose funding could be attributed to income tax 33 They are called millages because a property tax, rather than being expressed as a percentage of market value, may also be expressed as the amount of tax per $1,000 (the “mill” part) of taxable property value. So, if a property has a taxable value of $100,000, a 2 mill ($2.00 for every $1,000 of taxable value) will bring in $200 per household. 34 See http://urbancurrent.org/2012/12/06/metropolitanism-minnesotan-style-minnesota-land-of-bob-dylan-prince-the-coen-brothers-and-the-fiscal-disparities-law. 35 St. Louis, Missouri, established the first cultural tax district in 1969 (http://www.mzdstl.org) and has been followed by others including Denver, Colorado (see http://scfd. org), Allegheny County, Pennsylvania (http://www.radworkshere.org) and St. Paul. 36 This comes from the sales tax used to make bond repayments on the city of Minneapolis-owned baseball stadium. The tax is designed so that it consistently yields more than needed to repay bond-holders. The “slack” is used for five types of local good causes, including $1 million to a capital improvement fund that the Minnesota Twins (who lease the stadium) also contribute to. 37 Maryland was one of the first U.S. states to create a dedicated funding source to protect water quality, conserve natural areas, and create parks. The Program Open Space (POS) was started in 1969 by the Maryland Legislature and has been run since by the state’s Department of Natural Resources. 38 Details of similar measures in other states can be found at www.landvote.org. 39 Maryland has one of the highest income tax rates when state and local incomes taxes are combined, but even then these are still less than 10 percent of all tax raised in the state. Raising Money | 68
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THE NEW BARN-RAISING A toolkit for
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CONTENTS Summaries ................
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STRATEGY #1 — Raising Awareness I
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STRATEGY #3 — Raising Help In the
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• non-profit bodies (from civic-s
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The “New Barn-Raising” refers t
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Theme 2 — Market your assets Mark
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The advantage of these different ta
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Theme 6 — Public fundraising can
Page 19 and 20: Theme 10 — Business can best supp
Page 21 and 22: Theme 12 — Volunteering with asse
Page 23 and 24: INTRODUCTION This toolkit is direct
Page 25 and 26: In late 2011 and early 2012, people
Page 27 and 28: RAISING AWARENESS ABOUT YOUR ASSETS
Page 29 and 30: continued Table 2.1: A check-list o
Page 31 and 32: Who could support your assets? This
Page 33 and 34: Partnership With a partnership mode
Page 35 and 36: Table 2.2: Benefits for users - a c
Page 37 and 38: Table 2.4: Examples of the types of
Page 39 and 40: #1 — The “Killer Stat” Peavey
Page 41 and 42: Figure 2.7: Baltimore compared to o
Page 43 and 44: Figure 2.9: One of several punchy t
Page 45 and 46: Box 2.2: Recognize the skills that
Page 47 and 48: Delivering your message — messeng
Page 49 and 50: Figure 2.11: East Phillips delegate
Page 51 and 52: Figure 2.13: Barn-raising spirit -
Page 53 and 54: Draw attention to your “asset off
Page 55 and 56: Of particular use for local residen
Page 57 and 58: Figure 2.17: Example of the DIA’s
Page 59 and 60: #3 — You can take people on tours
Page 61 and 62: This is an ongoing map that can be
Page 63 and 64: Figure 2.24: Baltimore’s Fluid Mo
Page 65 and 66: As part of Hockey Weekend Across Am
Page 67 and 68: Figure 2.29: Poster for the 6th Ann
Page 69: Figure 2.30: Frogtown Gardens raise
Page 73 and 74: Box 3.1: Check-list of questions to
Page 75 and 76: Your asset managers need to use mon
Page 77 and 78: Table 3.4: Efficiency measures used
Page 79 and 80: Reductions in staff, asset numbers
Page 81 and 82: Table 3.5: Examples of charges comm
Page 83 and 84: Figure 3.4: Free entry for some gro
Page 85 and 86: Incentivize and support charging Wh
Page 87 and 88: You can rent space in assets to gen
Page 89 and 90: Your local government can secure re
Page 91 and 92: Box 3.4: Public-Private Partnership
Page 93 and 94: • Hand over a building that is an
Page 95 and 96: Community non-profits could be allo
Page 97 and 98: You can raise money and awareness b
Page 99 and 100: Figure 3.12: A memorial bench sold
Page 101 and 102: Figure 3.14: The annual and very po
Page 103 and 104: Elderly constant givers are a good
Page 105 and 106: Wealthier neighborhoods still have
Page 107 and 108: Young professional asset-supporter
Page 109 and 110: Figure 3.18: a potential fundee add
Page 111 and 112: Box 3.6: Getting high-net-worth ind
Page 113 and 114: Figure 3.20: A Detroit4Detroit webp
Page 115 and 116: Figure 3.21: Mowtown - example of a
Page 117 and 118: The barn-raising spirit is also see
Page 119 and 120: Charitable Foundations can add to y
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Table 3.15: Asset-related roles tha
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Encourage foundations to make their
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Help non-profit asset support organ
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Certainly, businesses have been an
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Table 3.20: Examples of mutually be
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Several factors can help you in dev
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Having co-operatives in your busine
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Box 3.12: Secrets of their success
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Table 3.24: Encouraging customer gi
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Table 3.25: Comparing the fee and a
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RAISING HELP FOR YOUR ASSET The men
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Figure 4.1: User input — resident
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When resources for paid staff, whet
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There are physical/logistical reaso
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There is a range of mechanisms for
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The measures have been largely succ
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Figure 4.5: Inside the Baltimore Co
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Table 4.5: Understanding the busine
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Volunteer managers and non-profits
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There are some key practical tips t
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There are a range of measures you c
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As with donors of money and other r
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Table 4.9 outlines a range of natio
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Where does the New Barn Raising con
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APPENDIX The following section was
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If you decide that you do want to s
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City of Saint Paul (2010), Transfor
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Morrish, R. and Brown, C. (2000), P
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CGAP (2012), “Comparing U.S. and
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Sargeant, A. and Shang, J. (2010),
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS German Marshall Fu
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Rademacher, Jolyn * Rey, Vernon * R
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Roberson, Jr., Dalton * Russ, Cathl
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Reierson, Gary * Rhodes, Carleen *
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Iyer, Seema Jacob France Institute
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Referees for, and support with, the
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