Doing it the Right Way

Several months ago, before I started this blog, I mentioned to several of those that I communicate with on a regular basis, a piece of property for sale in north-east Iowa. This property consisted of 1200 acres of land along the Upper Iowa River. In fact there are 3 1/4 miles of the river running through the property.
I joked with some of you about buying the property, I would farm the tillable land, and you'll could hunt on the timbered land.
This week the Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation a non-profit, private, conservation group, announced that they had purchased the property. See this article.

http://www.inhf.org/ryan.htm

I want to complement INHF on doing things the right way. Nothing agravaites me more than hearing that my tax dollars are being used to buy private property. And then as as added insult that same property is then taken off of the tax roles, so that the other property owners in that area then carry a higher burden for the taxes which maintain roads, schools and other public services. By buying this property with private funds, and keeping the property on the tax roles, the preservation of a beautiful part of Iowa's unique and varied topography. This purchase will enable this and future generations to see the beauty of God's creation, while keeping the burden of buying and maintaining it out of the hands of an ever expanding government.

I did not like reading that they may have gotten some funds with state money, but I will settle for the fact that they at least are keeping the property on the tax roles. How unfair to the farmers and people living around this beautiful piece of land to have it go into the public hands and then tell the tax payers that they will be handed a larger percentage of the property taxes as a legacy. If we are going to finance schools, roads and other public services with property tax, government which lives off of these taxes should not be allowed to take property off of the tax roles.