“We have met the enemy and he is us.” -Pogo. Our neighbors are not our enemies. But clichés about our town’s financial health are the enemy to finding solutions.

Since 2009 declining revenues have forced our leaders to underfund our assets. Revenue shortfalls “resulted in a decrease in infrastructure and amenity maintenance.”

Fountain Hills has marvelous assets – parks, roads, buildings, our fountain. We are consuming our assets without adequate funding to maintain them. Deferred costs to fix our roads are between $15 million and $23 million. We need properly functioning town assets.

Over 2,000 residents concluded through Vision Fountain Hills that a primary property tax is the fair and reliable way to maintain our town’s assets. Some disagree. Instead of asking what we who use the assets must do to maintain them, they ask, “who else can we get to pay for them?” They are the “growth will save us” proponents. They claim that growth is just around the corner, that new building projects will bring in developer fees, new sales tax revenues and other sources of someone else’s money. The facts to support a “growth will save us” solution are not there.

Fountain hills receives an average of $670 per resident in state and local tax revenues. 6,000 new residents will have to be added to raise the same revenue as a small property tax. It took Fountain Hills over 30 years to grow to 23,000 residents.

Another fact: despite whatever growth is achieved, not a penny of sustainable revenue will come to Fountain Hills. Fountain Hills will receive one-time developer fees, but once completed the “new growth” projects will provide no ongoing property tax revenue.

Facts are stubborn things. Facts show that “growth will save us” is a hollow cliché, not a solution.