While he is still deliberating speaking at the upcoming June 4 budget public hearing before Roanoke Rapids City Council, one resident did let the panel know his feelings on the proposed financial plan and impacts of the recent property revaluation Tuesday evening.

Jonathan Benthall, a former city police officer, referenced an opinion piece he had written in which calculations show the proposed budget equates to a 25 percent increase. “After I had written the letter to the editor I got some feedback and it was suggested to me, ‘Well Benthall take and apply these numbers for you personally and how it’s going to hit your pocketbook and your evaluation on the home that you own.’”

He signed up to speak during the unscheduled public comment section of meeting.

Benthall researched the numbers on his own property from the Halifax County Tax Department’s website.

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His personal situation is his home was valued at $102,000. “Through the process of the revaluation it’s now allegedly worth $111,400. Do a little bit of simple math and subtract the numbers one from the other, that's an increase of $9,400. For me personally that’s an 8.44 percent increase in the value of my house.”

He then broke that down to the dollar amounts of what he had to pay last year — $674.22 — and what he will be expected to pay under the new proposed rate — $714.07. “Subtract the old from the new and that’s only a difference of $39.85 — about 40 bucks. One guy’s $40 might be somebody else’s $400. Dealing with somebody else’s money I think it’s kind of easy to say ‘well you can handle that.’ That’s a broad brush to paint with to assume someone else’s circumstances and the dollar amount and how it will affect that person.”

Truly, he said, “Forty dollars isn’t that big of a deal to me. I can afford $40.”

He said, however, “It also struck me as funny that it’s only $40. There’s still $1.6 million that we hope to come up with. Forty dollars is not a drop in the bucket to get to that. That’s a long row to hoe at $40 a pop.”

In further calculations he looked at how the budget and revaluation would impact his parents’ house which is about a block from his. “The same neighborhood should be a comparable change between property values you would think.”

Both his parents are retired and are on fixed incomes. They also care for an elderly family member. “It seems like the comment was ‘well, not doing this increase is only going to benefit those who own a lot of property or those who are very rich.’ My parents are not very rich.”

His parents’ house went from $137,400 to $175,000 during the revaluation. “That’s a change of $33,100. They got hit with a 19 percent increase on their property.”

He said their taxes will go from $908 to about $1,100. “That’s a 20 percent increase for them. That’s $200 to them. There’s a wide disparity seemingly between how these properties are being valued across town. So what doesn’t hurt one person will hurt another person. I just encourage everybody who might read this or see this later on online to get on the tax website, do the math for yourself and see if it’s going to hit you for $40, $200, or wherever inbetween and let these guys know how you feel about it so we’re all informed and they can make a better decision for us.”