To the Editor:

I was surprised by the placating nature of the lead story "Goffstown tax rate up by $3.40" by Greg Kwasnik and Sarah Lebrun in the Goffstown News this past week. 
The dismissive attitude of most of those quoted in the story implied this tax increase was just a bit of spare change and not something to bother our pretty little heads about.

Town Administrator Susan Desruisseaux felt the town’s tax increase would not discourage potential home buyers from buying in Goffstown. Then the 2009 school tax rates in Bedford $11.95, Bow $13.58, Amherst $13.69 and Hopkinton $16.11 were brought up to illustrate just how low the Goffstown school tax rate is in comparison.

What the story failed to mention was that the town tax rates for those same towns are $3.99 in Bedford, $5.06 in Bow, $3.38 in Amherst and $5.08 in Hopkinton compared with the Goffstown 2009 town tax rate of $8.68.

Credit is due the Goffstown school district for doing more with less in the past but the obvious profligate spending habits of those running Goffstown are concerning.

If you truly think potential home buyers don’t pay overly much attention to the property tax rates let me just say as a recent addition to Goffstown, you are deceiving yourself and those residents who actually believe you.

My family and I paid close attention to tax rates when calculating what we could afford for a mortgage and where we wanted to settle and quite frankly with the announcement of the 2010 Goffstown property tax increase, we are suffering from a severe case of buyer’s remorse.

Robert Morris
Goffstown