On May 28, Prince George’s County Executive Rushern L. Baker III proposed to the Prince George’s County Council a 15 percent property tax increase for county residents,  which was projected to raise the amount of funding for county schools by 133 million dollars. According to the Washington Post, this increase was rejected by the council, but a much smaller increase of 4 percent, about 34 million dollars in education funding, was approved instead.

Considering that they are not paying taxes quite yet, students were understandably oblivious to the current tax rates; when they were asked which of four counties, including PG County, had the highest property tax rates, not one student guessed correctly.

Based on the 2014-2015 tax rates that were published by the Maryland State Department of Assessments and Taxation, for a 300,000 dollar home in each of the following counties, the approximate yearly property tax rates are as follows:

1. Howard County – $2,185.20

2. Prince George’s County – $2,073.60

3. Anne Arundel County – $2,037.60

4. Montgomery County – $1,580.40

These rankings are subject to change, however, since this 4 percent increase was calculated to raise the property taxes on a 300,000 dollar home in PG County by about 450 dollars per year, as reported by WUSA9, knocking out Howard County residents as the highest property tax payers by over 300 dollars.

Such rates brought an overall reaction of surprise from students, some of which shook their heads in disapproval at the seemingly high costs. Several students, such as sophomore Emma Jett, expressed that they did not know where all of the money is going. “I guess other counties just put more money into their schools than PG,” Jett said.

Freshman Delante Peete agreed, saying that “if we pay two-thousand dollars a year, we should have nice schools.”

The tax raise just “doesn’t make sense,” said junior Gabriel Kalu.

There was a clear consensus between students that the counties with the highest taxes are expected to have the nicest school, parks, and community facilities.

“Well, Arundel has all the gated communities and malls and lakes,” explained freshman Alison Graham as to why she thought Anne Arundel County would have the highest property taxes.

Some students though thought that there were better ways to solve the problem of education funding. The county doesn’t “do a good job of managing” money, said Kalu. Jett agreed, sharing the sentiment that “It would be better if [county officials] reapportioned where the money is going in the county.”

Optimism about the tax increase persevered, however. “It’ll show that PG is a really nice county,” said Graham.

This optimism only grew further when students were informed that the increase in taxes would also result in a substantial increase of education funding. Each student had their own idea of in what way the money would be well spent.

Both Jett and Graham said they thought that more money should be spent on arts programs. “They’re slowly slipping away from schools when they’re important,” said Graham. “The money they do have is mostly raised by the students involved.”

Junior Victoria Holmes said that the money should go towards building new schools and filling them with well-trained teachers.

Kalu and Peete were in agreement that the money should be used to improve the county’s current schools. The schools “need some fixing up,” said Peete. “Maybe we should work towards higher quality books,” Kalu said.