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Private public school

AprilLVEAprilLVE member
in Stay at Home Moms
The thread on type of elementary school has me thinking, at what point is a public school really a de facto private school? And how do those that are big public school supporters feel about it?

For example, our town's schools are consistently rated in the top ten in the state. The real estate is modest, and moderately priced compared to many places, but the school taxes are sky high. We live in an average sized home for the town, and pay about $1K per month. In my opinion, this pretty much is tuition and makes our schools basically private. The high taxes restrict who can move into the town and thus use the schools, just like tuition and an application process would for private schools.

What do you all think?
DD - 12/31/13
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Re: Private public school

  • Mrs.HizzoMrs.Hizzo member
    You're saying that you pay $1K in taxes that go solely to education?
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  • AprilLVEAprilLVE member
    cjcouple said:
    idk, taxes fund much more than schools/education. I would not consider that private. even if it restrictive. however there are schools that are private except for their residents. the towns pay the kids tuition because they do not have a public school. my sisters town does not have a public high school. so the town covers kids tuition to their choice school. 2 of which are private and 2 public.
    I have never heard of this before. Interesting!
    DD - 12/31/13
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  • AprilLVEAprilLVE member
    Mrs.Hizzo said:
    You're saying that you pay $1K in taxes that go solely to education?
    The school tax portion. I realize there are other places with higher property/school tax (like NJ), but ours are extremely high in comparison with the surrounding communities and region.
    DD - 12/31/13
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  • AprilLVEAprilLVE member
    cjcouple said:
    idk, taxes fund much more than schools/education. I would not consider that private. even if it restrictive. however there are schools that are private except for their residents. the towns pay the kids tuition because they do not have a public school. my sisters town does not have a public high school. so the town covers kids tuition to their choice school. 2 of which are private and 2 public.
    Not literally private, obviously. Maybe a better way to say it is, do you look at school tax like tuition?
    DD - 12/31/13
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  • AprilLVEAprilLVE member
    Well, it's a little over $11k for the year, so just shy. I could be confusing the school and property portions, but I think that's the school part. They are billed together.I'd have to look. Regardless, they are high for the region. Our last home in a different area was less than $3.

    The $4400 actually sounds low to me for NJ. I'm always hearing horror stories of taxes in the $20k a year range.
    DD - 12/31/13
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  • AprilLVEAprilLVE member
    Ok, I looked up rates and our millage for school tax is 27.13. County and municipality combined are about 11. However, based on what I just looked at I was wrong to say we have an average house. Our assessed value is considerably higher than what is listed as the median.

    How do those millage rates compare with NJ?
    DD - 12/31/13
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  • AprilLVEAprilLVE member
    I didn't mean to make this all about taxes, but it's interesting, so whatevs. I'm assuming all the services you listed after education are paid by the county and municipality portions. So in our case, education is approx. 3/4ths and everything else is paid out of the remaining quarter.

    According to the websites I'm looking at, our state median for total property tax is $2200 and my municipality is just over $7k, with the school portion being just over $5k.

    I guess the reason I asked the question in the first place, is you don't hear people say they moved to a high tax town because of the great trash pick up or whatever. It's always about the schools. Know what I mean?
    DD - 12/31/13
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  • AndrewsgalAndrewsgal member
    We live in amazing school district. We pay out the butt for taxes. It is what it is. IMO it is worth it.
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  • AprilLVEAprilLVE member
    LalaMama81 said:
    I'll put it out there - we are in PA, right outside of Philadelphia and our total taxes are $6k. $5k goes to the school and the other $1k goes to the township, county, etc. We live in a 85 year old twin that's 1500 sq ft on less than a 1/10th of an acre.  The school district is run completely separately than the rest of the gov't. 

    You could easily pay $12k a year in my township just for education IF you had a larger property and/or a large home. I just looked up a house literally 1/4 of a mile away - on 1.33 acres, probably 100+ years old, would sell for maybe $600k now (low, sadly), maybe 6000 sq feet and the taxes for the school district alone are $15k. Ironically, those people send their kids to private school. 

    My parents live on 7 acres in south jersey in a 3000 sq ft house and pay $20k in taxes. It's insane b/c they couldn't sell their property for more than $300k right now. 

    Point being - this stuff varies greatly. 
    Sounds a lot like or town, just swap Pittsburgh for Philadelphia. Do older people tend to move out once their kids are out of school? That's pretty common here, because they can move just a few miles and drastically reduce their tax burden.
    DD - 12/31/13
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  • AprilLVEAprilLVE member
    Andrewsgal said:
    We live in amazing school district. We pay out the butt for taxes. It is what it is. IMO it is worth it.
    Would you choose to live there if you didn't have children?
    DD - 12/31/13
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  • AndrewsgalAndrewsgal member
    LalaMama81 said:
    I'll put it out there - we are in PA, right outside of Philadelphia and our total taxes are $6k. $5k goes to the school and the other $1k goes to the township, county, etc. We live in a 85 year old twin that's 1500 sq ft on less than a 1/10th of an acre.  The school district is run completely separately than the rest of the gov't. 

    You could easily pay $12k a year in my township just for education IF you had a larger property and/or a large home. I just looked up a house literally 1/4 of a mile away - on 1.33 acres, probably 100+ years old, would sell for maybe $600k now (low, sadly), maybe 6000 sq feet and the taxes for the school district alone are $15k. Ironically, those people send their kids to private school. 

    My parents live on 7 acres in south jersey in a 3000 sq ft house and pay $20k in taxes. It's insane b/c they couldn't sell their property for more than $300k right now. 

    Point being - this stuff varies greatly. 

    This is about what taxes are in our area. However another poster who lives not far from me says hers aren't even close to that.
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