San Francisco business owners have banded together and are now demanding tax refunds because of the utter chaos in the streets that has destroyed their businesses thanks to the city’s abject failure to protect them.
The businessmen, who are calling their group the “Tenderloin Business Coalition,” are made up of 135 businesses and property owners in the city’s Tenderloin District, according to the Epoch Times.
They say that the city’s failure to protect them from drug users, protesters, criminals, and the homeless should result in a tax refund since the city didn’t do what it is obligated to do.
They maintain that drug users, sellers, and the homeless have made the streets so unsafe that customers have been scared away.
The business owners are wondering why they should pay taxes if the money doesn’t go to protect them and keep their businesses safe.
“The city has abandoned its commitment to provide a baseline of safety in the neighborhood, thus significant effort and investments made by the business owners and property owners to keep their blocks safe and clean have come to nothing. It is clear the state of the neighborhood is declining. We represent that this is a violation of the City’s implicit bargain with the taxpayer: pay your taxes and the city will ensure safe streets,” the group said.
“Our customers are unwilling to enter the neighborhood to patronize our businesses,” they added.
“The result is a catastrophic loss of revenue for the small businesses that are vital to the health and safety of the neighborhood. Due to this untenable situation, businesses are closing and there is a real and palpable fear that the neighborhood is now on the verge of collapse,” they said.
Well, you can’t blame them, can you?
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