Posted on 07/19/2017 8:01:54 PM PDT by Rebelbase
I’ve posted before about how Williamstown (Kentucky) officials are instituting a “safety fee” for ticket-taking attractions in the city.
If implemented, the city would charge Ark Encounter 50 cents per ticket to go towards things like fire trucks and police cars — all the things that make the city a safer place for residents and tourists. Using the estimate of 1.4 million visitors a year, this would amount to approximately $700,000 that Ark Encounter would owe the city annually.
The Creationists at Ark Encounter, however, say they should be exempt from that charge because they run a non-profit ministry. You wouldn’t force a church to pay taxes, now, would you?!
The problem is that up until now, Ark Encounter has legally been a for-profit business in order to receive a number of tax incentives from the city and state. That’s why officials in Williamstown figured they could ask Ark Encounter to pay up. It’s not a church; it’s a money-making tourist attraction. They recently went ahead with their plans to make Ark Encounter pay the fee.
City leaders are now bracing for a lawsuit from the very organization that was supposed to save the local economy.
Meanwhile, Ark Encounter just took the boldest step yet to avoid paying the 50 cent surcharge.
According to the Lexington Herald-Leader‘s Linda Blackford, the team behind Ark Encounter recently sold the land on which the giant boat rests for a whopping $10.
… Ark Encounter LLC sold its main parcel of land — the one with the life-size Noah’s Ark — for $10 to their non-profit affiliate, Crosswater Canyon. Although the property is worth $48 million according to the Grant County Property Valuation Administrator, the deed says its value is only $18.5 million.
That’s the latest salvo in an escalating argument between local officials and Ark Encounter, but some are worried Ark Encounter’s maneuver is a precursor to declaring itself exempt from all taxes, including property taxes that help fund Grant County schools.
Just to summarize here, Ark Encounter used its for-profit status to receive all sorts of tax breaks. Then the Creationists told Williamstown officials that they ran a non-profit ministry to avoid paying more taxes. And now they’re basically confessing that they were a for-profit business this whole time because they just sold the boat to the non-profit entity that oversees it.
If that’s confusing… well, welcome to how Creationists think.
Let’s suppose for a moment that all of this is legal. At best, it suggests that Ark Encounter is incredibly unethical. Williamstown gave the Creationists cheap land and tax breaks galore over the next few decades with the hope that Ark Encounter would eventually create lots of jobs and bring in tourists who would spend money at surrounding businesses.
Ken Ham is paying them back by restricting jobs to his anti-gay Creationist buddies, threatening to sue the city over the safety fee, and finding a way to possibly withhold taxes that would fund local schools.
[Mayor Rick] Skinner said losing all of Ark Encounter’s property taxes would hurt the city, county, and most of all, schools.
“It would be a huge hit to the schools,” he said.
Skinner said he is “disappointed” in how much the town’s relationship with Ark officials has deteriorated, but said he would wait to comment further until Tuesday’s meeting.
Here’s a statement that will surprise nobody: Ken Ham doesn’t care about public schools. When you’re playing the game of Christian indoctrination, education is the enemy. You think Ham gives a damn about public schools not getting money from his business? Not a chance. He’ll consider that a victory.
Once again, Creationists are screwing over the city that bent over backwards to give them a home. Critics have been saying that for years. Unfortunately, it looks like local officials are finally realizing it when it’s too late.
(Thanks to Matt for the link. Portions of this article were published earlier)
G1. Doesn’t The Bible say that God uses the rainbow as a sign that he will never wipe out man again with the flood?
As biased as this comes across, I would like to see some independent verification from different sources.
The attraction should be allowed to buy insurance, which would reimburse the city for any costs incurred by sending police, firemen, or other emergency responders. This way, professional actuaries would be doing the calculating.
There could be some untoward wheeling and dealing on both sides. I wish the avowedly Christian side would act like it’s all about God — who cares about a lot of things.
It’s a tourist attraction and according to Kentucky law it deserved the tax break. Why don’t you whiners get this upset with Planned Parenthood?
How did this “safety tax” come to pass? It sounds like they are singling out the Ark Encounter for a special tax.
Hemant Mehta is an author, blogger, and atheist activist who gained fame for “selling his soul” on eBay. Mehta is a regular speaker at atheist events and has sat on the boards of charitable organizations such as the Secular Student Alliance and the Foundation Beyond Belief. He also runs a blog on Patheos, in which he and his associates publish articles several times a day.
Excellent tagline.
[by restricting jobs to his anti-gay Creationist buddies]
Thanks for the info. It was obvious the writer was a frothing liberal. They never seem to miss this one little agenda......
We visited last fall with 2 busloads.
First, the project wasn’t nearly complete. Looking at the plan there was almost half of the development left to finish, even break ground on. This increased taxation would come at a terrible time. The ark itself is mostly done, but a number of the displays are not, the theme park is not and the eateries are not. Huge expense remains.
I do not recall seeing any police at all. Parking, directions, etc were all by park staff.
We ate at in the locality when we left, so we dumped about 2000 on the local economy.
No...... imbicile writer, this isn’t how “creationists” think.
Frankly, this creationist thinks if this is true, those are some shady people running that Ark attraction. It just sounds plain wrong.
The lack of clear writing really bothers me. It is obvious that a Christian-based attraction would not be using the gay pride flag colors to light their attraction. God’s rainbow has indigo in it. The gay pride flag skips that, and goes from blue to violet. (It was to save space I think.)
The gay flag also started off with hot pink (for “sex”) on top of the red stripe. But hot pink fabric was too expensive, so they quit using it.
Interestingly, the indigo in the original gay pride flag represented “harmony”. Although I doubt anything would be any different if they had left the color in.
It was only a short time ago that I learned something about the ark. I always figured his neighbors thought Noah was crazy for building an ark in order to survive a huge flood. It was only recently that I learned that before the flood - it had never rained on Earth!! They must have REALLY thought he was nuts.
We’ve become conditioned into seeing the rainbow as a symbol of peversion.
Now we recoil when we see it in its rightful place.
“And just what do you perceive that photo to represent?”
Looks like something a homosexual with size deficiencies would build ...
You see what I mean, I hope.
We’ve become so disturbed as a society that we automatically see a Rainbow as a homosexual symbol.
They know how to fleece suckers!
Obviously an anti-Christian writer.
Just how much money did they collect from the Creation Museum before it came to town? How did they pay for schools then?
They shouldn’t be taxed in the first place, thus needing no “tax breaks”.
Is “Creationists” now a pejorative?
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