How the Government is Ruining the Lives of Families Blessed by Extreme Makeover Home Edition

November 22, 2007 By Matthew Paulson

ABC was onto something when they developed the idea for Extreme Makeover Home Edition. It was a dramatic change from the typical serial-dramas and sitcoms that we see on prime-time television these days. Millions of Americans watch the show each week, and now state and federal government are coming in and messing with the lives of the families which have been blessed by the show. It’s hard enough to go through the things that those families did, especially when most of them lived in very poor living conditions. The last thing they need is the government coming in and taking their new found blessings away.

Let’s take a look at the Llanes family. Before the show they have a small split-level home with very steep stairways and faulty plumbing. That home was valued at around $220,000 a year and they paid $6,110 annually in property taxes according to the city’s tax assessor. After the folks from Extreme Makeover Home Edition came in the city evaluated their new home at $497,000 adding an additional $8,440 to the $6,110 they were already paying annually. It’s unconscionable to think that that a family with two nearly-blind daughters and a mother with thyroid cancer that’s in remission should have to cough over $10,000 extra a year just so that the government doesn’t take their house away from them.

The folks at Extreme Makeover Home Edition know that it’s often too much for the families who receive new homes to pay for their dramatically increased taxes, so they are afforded some additional funds to help defray their property taxes. Sometimes they will be shown holding a benefit event on the show to help raise money for the family. Of course that money won’t last forever and the families will have to begin paying enormous amounts property taxes to their local government. The worst part of all of it is that the money given to the families to help pay for their property taxes can be subject to Federal gift tax, so if the show or an individual makes a large contribution to the family in need, they have to pay the IRS for the privilege of doing so, it’s sick!

The Llanes family isn’t the only one who’s been hit with a huge property tax bill. Brian Wofford and his family were on the show and given a new home valued at $410,000. After the building was complete he received a “supplementary property tax assessment” bill for $2,700, and that’s on top of the taxes he had already paid for the entire year! Stephen Johnson, a firefighter from Jackson County Florida, was issued a $3,891 “supplementary property tax assessment” tax bill after being given a new home from the kind folks at ABC.

Why can’t the government just leave these people alone? Out of all the people to pick on to pay for their programs, why does it have to be the families with debilitating diseases, traumatic losses, and all sorts of other pain that we can only begin to imagine? Why can’t the government just let Extreme Makeover Home Edition bless these families and leave well enough alone?

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