I just stumbled across what is potentially another unintended consequence of the property tax revision; not necessarily good, not necessarily bad, just unintended. Capital costs of government buildings can be supported by local income taxes more easily than the operating costs. The operating costs, I believe, are more likely to have to be supported by property taxes. With property taxes less available, the trend for construction projects payable out of income taxes may be to try to reduce operating costs by incurring more up front capital costs — for example, more expensive, but more energy efficient construction materials.
Just a thought. I might be very, very wrong.
I think that would be great. However, the trend seems to be that the more money available, the more that is spent on making the building “pretty” and designing it with all sorts of weird angles that just drive up the costs. Making it cost less in the long run seems to be something that is avoided.
Again, my experiance is with schools, so I may also be wrong about some government buildings. The last school I worked on, they did not have a single 90 degree angle in the entire building. Seriously. It is like the designer had some feng-shui mumbo-jumbo about demons liking square rooms or something.
Each of those 100 degree or 72 degree corners or sweeping, curved hallways requires tons more work in drywall and framing than a simple square would have. On top of that, most of the rooms had 20 foot ceilings, resulting in 12 feet of air that would need to be cooled or heated for no reason at all…