State Report Card
Financial Support and Investments
View/download Residential
Property Value per Student Compared to Tax Rate (PDF format, 22
KB)
WHAT YOU ARE LOOKING AT
This chart shows information about each district’s’
ability to
generate revenue to support its municipal services, including its
schools. The
next chart, Relative Tax Capacity and Effort, shows
information
about each district’s ability to generate revenue compared with its
efforts to do
so. The data are supplied by the RI Department of Administration,
Office of
Municipal Affairs. We thank that office for its cooperation and
help. The property value per pupil is calculated by dividing the
total assessed value for
all the property in the district by the average daily enrollment of
public school
students residing in that district. The tax rate is set by the local
government,
expressed as a dollar rate per $1,000 of property value. Thus a
$10.00 tax rate
on a $100,000 home will raise $1,000 in tax revenue. A house valued
at $50,000
will raise only half that amount, or $500. A poorer community, whose
houses
have an average value of $50,000 will have to raise its tax rate to
$20.00 per
$1,000 in order to generate $1,000.
WHAT YOU ARE LOOKING FOR
You notice the inequities among the 36 districts resulting from
the value of their residential property. Municipal salaries, such as
those of teachers, cost roughly the same from community to
community, so poor communities must tax their citizens at much
higher rates to generate the same amount of revenue as wealthier
communities.
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