Lancaster board seeks input, fairness in taxes

by Jackie Nunnery

LANCASTER—In the first of at least two tax workshops, the Lancaster board of supervisors met November 21 with 20 concerned residents to discuss how the county could “find a way to be fair and distribute the tax burden as fairly and equally as possible,” said District 5 supervisor Robert Westbrook.

“I was hopeful that there would be more people here,” District 1 supervisor Jack Larson said shortly after the workshop got underway. “You need to encourage other folks to know what’s going on and what we’re trying to do here.”

Westbrook and Larson have been researching the issue, comparing the 18 different taxing categories that Virginia’s General Assembly has granted to localities to generate revenue.

Westbrook hopes that by diversifying and redistributing the taxes, “we will have enough funds to do the things we need to do to bring ourselves up from…