Tonight at 7, at city hall on Green Street, make your voice heard at the public planning board hearing on a 42-unit CATCH apartment complex. It would be next to the Penacook cemetery on Village Street. It is estimated that 25 students would come from there. At $10,000 to $160,000 (special needs) per student, it would far outweigh the taxes to be paid by the CATCH development ($50,000 to $80,000).
Fewer students would come from this development if all the units were one bedroom, or the units were for senior citizens, or if there were half the units and more green space. The CATCH plan includes 24 two-bedroom units and 12 three-bedroom units, according to the Concord Planning Department.
The root problem is twofold. Penacook is among the poorest in property value in New Hampshire. Over half of our property taxes pay for Penacook schools based on the number of students. Out of a $33 per thousand tax rate, $18 goes to the school. Yet our schools pay less per student than most N.H. municipalities. Portsmouth’s costs are $18,346 per student and taxes at $4.96 per thousand. If we had villages of $1 million houses in Penacook, our rate would go down. If we had huge industries on Whitney Road for instance, like an Amazon distribution center, our taxes would go down. But we don’t. We remain poor in terms of assessable property. The second problem lies with the determination of Concord to provide more apartment complexes due to a shortage of housing in the area. Most in the city council are pushing for apartments without first fixing Penacook’s primary problem of an inadequate tax base.
CAROL M. BREAULT
Penacook