January revelation details how much tax revenue coming from Sedona Taxing District for Community College education
On January 17, 2014, at the request of Sedona’s mayor Rob Adams, a detailed analysis was prepared by Sedona financial experts that unearthed how much in property taxes was being paid by residents in the Sedona Taxing District to support Yavapai Community College. As far as one can tell, there had never been such an analysis made by any taxing district in Yavapai County.
The analysis revealed that residents of the Sedona Taxing District were annually paying a total of $6.6 million dollars to support Yavapai Community College. This was a stunning revelation for taxpayers and politicians.
The analysis came at a time when the College had stripped the Sedona Center for Arts and Technology of all its classes including the outstanding Film School program. The College was clearly preparing to sell the property because it claimed it was not a good teaching facility and there were access issues that it had not settled in a dozen years.
The disclosure of the the taxes paid and the potential closing of the facility outraged citizens in the Sedona and throughout the Verde Valley. With the help of the well-informed Sedona mayor and City Council, and citizen outrage, the College changed its mind in about a month and reached an agreement about access. It then changed its mind about selling the property suggesting it probably never had intended to do so in the first place–it was only “contemplating” a sale. The public revelation of the amount of taxes being paid no doubt played a major role in the reversal.