Washington City Paper: Contents for Dec. 2

The D.C. Tax-Free Zone
Why should you have to pay taxes when the District's multimillion-dollar nonprofits don't?

Cover Story

The exodus of middle-income residents from the District may go down as the last great migration of the 20th century. Citing deplorable municipal services, rising crime, and an ineffectual educational system, these former D.C. stalwarts have become D.C. haters.

Almost to a one, the departing hordes complain about the District's confiscatory taxes—income, property, and sales—which make Washingtonians' tax bills among the highest in the land.

But while the polis-sustaining taxpayers escape to Northern Virginia and the Maryland suburbs, a parasite burrows deeper into the District's flesh: the multitude of nonprofit, tax-exempt organizations.

Nonprofit churches, institutions, and charities have flocked to the city and are growing like kudzu. Drawn by the District's liberal policies, the nonprofits have taken millions of dollars of taxable property off the Department of Finance and Revenue's (DFR) rolls. And while residents and businesses have endured the sting of the hike in the sales tax from 6 to 7 percent, the nonprofits have remained immune. They are exempt from sales tax on nearly everything they purchase—pencils, carpets, trucks, and more.

Taxpaying citizens must jump through fiery hoops to secure building permits for backyard decks, but churches are given building permits and zoning waivers for their expansion almost as a matter of right.

All the while, the burgeoning nonprofits are consuming basic services that cost billions to maintain: police and fire protection, the courts, the transportation infrastructure, just to mention the big-ticket items.... Continued

Issue of Dec. 2 - 8, 1994

News and Features

The D.C. Tax-Free Zone
Why should you have to pay taxes when the District's multimillion-dollar nonprofits don't?
Cover Story By Jonetta Rose Barras
Outlaw Bikers
In Rock Creek Park, Illegal Mountain Biking Spooks Hikers and Horses
The City By John Briley
Racial Politics Divide D.C. School of Law
The City By Clara Jeffery
Don't Worry, Be Happy
The Compliment Man Blesses Each and Every One
The City By Eddie Dean
A Club by Any Other Name?
The City By Clara Jeffery
Bring Me John Fahey
The Mail By John Moore
Un-Hospitable
The Mail By Tom Oliver
Here Comes the Neighborhood
The Mail By Alain Letort
Captive Captions
The Mail By Nancy Taylor
Mystery Inspector
The Mail By William Addams Reitwiesner
Yard Work
The Mail By Dave Ricks
More on Less
The Mail By Keith C. Ivey
The Back-Issues Issue
The Mail By Matthew Gilmore
Class Struggles
The Mail By Joan T. Prival and Michael J. Prival
Unknown
The Mail By Tom Epps