Editor, Gazette-Journal:

Having my personal property tax rise 35 percent was a good indicator which way Mathews County had decided to go, but when my hundred-year-old farm house went from $132,800 to $214,400, an increase of $81,600, about 60 percent increase, led to the question: Why does Mathews County need all this money?

Have they changed the direction to keep our county intact and opted for growing government? I asked one supervisor this and didn’t get an answer.

I’m 65 and have been a resident of Mathews for 31 years, lived in harmony with beautiful people who vote their mind, and show how we want to keep Mathews. Who has been asleep at the switch that all of a sudden we are faced with such an increase in taxes? When the magnitude of 35 percent and higher occurs, it leaves me thinking taxes are going to rise faster than the middle class can keep up with, and sooner than later the rich will gobble up lost homes at deflated prices.

Are our supervisors out of touch with what is going on in America? We are in an economic downturn. I feel it. To defend the tax hike, one county official likened Mathews to Northern Virginia. We have nothing in common with Northern Virginia, but perhaps now we do … high taxes. Our children have to leave the county to get jobs because we have little commerce to offer. Whose fault is that? Not the taxpayers. Have I been led down the wrong path? Is the county government moving into the 21st century, leaving me in the 19th? I will vote for anyone who has the ability to keep our county running smoothly during troubling times. I don’t want a runaway tax plan and be held hostage in my home.

I should not be faced with the insecurity of a bleak future that is now presented me. But worst of all, I fear the very thing I stood for will now come crashing down, my worldview. What attracted me to Mathews; the very rich, the middle class and the poor, all living together in peace and harmony. I fear that’s doomed. I’m deeply saddened Mathews will become a county of the elite.

If you are not growing Mathews County government, then why are taxes going up at such rates? Why does the county need the extra money? I’m still looking for answers.

John Atkinson

Gwynn, Va.