UPDATE: The taxed protest: Another legal challenge to Dulles Rail
10/15/09 2:07 PM EDT
A Petition for Appeal of Fairfax Circuit Court Judge Jane Marum Roush’s dismissal of a constitutional challenge to the financing mechanism for Dulles Rail has been filed with the Virginia Supreme Court.
Attorney James Markels represents FFW Enterprises, which owns commercial property in Tysons Corner that is subject to two taxes on commercial and industrial property within the Northern Virginia Transportation Authority. The taxes will be used to pay for Phase 1 of Dulles Rail.
But, with a few exceptions such as farmland, Article X of the Virginia Constitution requires that all taxes be “uniform.” Markels argues that the General Assembly exceeded its constitutional authority by excluding other owners of commercial and residential property, who will also benefit from Dulles Rail. For that reason, FFW Enterprises is also questioning the validity of bonds that will be sold to pay for Dulles Rail.
“These taxes force a tiny minority of landowners in the County to pay for all of the roads everyone uses....If these taxes pass constitutional muster, then the General Assembly will be able to force commercial and industrial real property owners to shoulder the entire burden of any and all public improvements throughout the Commonwealth...
“At some point, the difference between the taxed and the untaxed merely becomes a matter of who has political sway in the General Assembly. That is a far cry, in our view, from the ‘uniform’ taxation guaranteed by the Virginia Constitution,” Markels says in a detailed synopsis of the case, which can be found here:
http://vabusinesslaw.wordpress.com/2009/09/08/challenge-to-two-virginia-taxes-headed-to-virginia-supreme-court/
The same thing is happening to drivers on the Dulles Toll Road, who will be taxed to pay for more than half of Phase 2 - more than commercial property owners and the federal government combined.
If these highly discriminatory and confiscatory taxes pass constitutional muster, it won’t take long before Virginia is no longer considered a good place to live, let alone the “best place in the nation” to do business.
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