The Observation Deck

Paying taxes is generally not very fun, but the new tax office in Lakewood is well staffed and helpful. I've been there a handful of times since it opened. I much prefer it to dealing with R.I.T.A..

Last year I went at tax time. The woman in line ahead of me was furious that she had gotten a bill for Lakewood city tax. The tax lady (I'm calling her that to avoid confusing her with the furious woman.) at the counter patiently looked up her records and informed her that she did, in fact, have a tax liability. Well, this caused an eruption of "Now, how am I gonna pay for that?!?" and "I've lived in Lakewood for SEVEN YEARS, and I've had a job the whole time, and I've never had to pay Lakewood taxes before!" She stormed out as the tax lady made notes.

When I got to the counter, the tax lady politely asked if she could help me. I said, "Yes, but can I ask you a question first?" She said, "Sure." I asked, "When people say stuff like that, do you look into it?" She smiled and said, "You bet we do."

Well, I chuckled about that for days. Some people never know when to shut up. I figured the Tax Department was now going to be looking back at the woman's six previous years of untaxed income. Wow!

I know one of the reasons to leave R.I.T.A. was to collect from some of the more difficult non-payers that they wouldn't/couldn't go after. I wonder how this is working out. Was the furious woman incident an example of the city doing a better job at finding and collecting from those that owe taxes? Is there data on this?

I agree, the Lakewood tax office is great and helpful. I even posted about my experience calling them with an e-file question.

I will tell you also that Lakewood's tax form, for all its complexities, is absolutely nothing compared to the awful CCA tax form I just got in the mail.

I for the life of me cannot figure out how the heck to fill the thing out and the little booklet that came with it is worthless. It's such a pain especially since I moved to Willoughby Hills in September and only need to pay 3 months of CCA tax.

If I wasn't such an honest citizen, I would just ignore it. Personally I think if government really wants us to pay taxes, they need to make it simple.

After years of dealing with RITA incompetence I am so grateful for the Lakewood Tax Department. They are efficient and knowledgeable, which is shocking to find in a government office.

While I am happy that you have had positive experiences with the tax department - our experience has been different.

My children I think have been harrassed by the Lakewood tax department. They have gotten letters from them every year and we have had to prove that they were students. My son this year had to prove he was not earning taxable income for many years - I think it went back to when he was 13 years of age. We have sent and resent information from both of their colleges time and time again.

So imagine our surprise when my newly graduated daughter bought her first condo in Lakewood this year and insead of getting a "Welcome to the City" package from the city of Lakewood, she got a very tersly worded letter from the tax department that told her she was to appear before a judge because she hadn't paid income tax. (Interestingly enough it was addressed to Dear Resident/Occupant.) Again after several hours worth of calls and faxes from the college, she was able to prove that she didn't owe anything.

They hadn't looked to see who was living there and if they had paid!!!!! They just assumed they hadn't.

When we moved to the city many, many years ago, we got a Welcome Wagon package with coupons to various restaurants and stores in Lakewood - how times have changed and in this case not for the better. If we want to appeal to young, new buyers, maybe a more welcoming attitude would be just the ticket. And the city could get the names of the residents and determine if they owed money before harrassing them.

I'm not sure we want to great new buyers to our city this way. I'm not sure it is worth our while to harrass children about their earnings. When I look at the cost of doing this and the negative impact to our city - I wonder why we are doing this.

Sometimes I wonder how they determine who should pay. Do they depend on resident honestly, or do people who live in apartments get a free pass, and only get taxed if they send in the forms? It annoys me that those of us who always file on time are helping pay for those who don't bother to file at all.

For years, I worked for a Cleveland employer who did not deduct RITA taxes from my paychecks. We all know that we were supposed to make quarterly installments of our RITA taxes but if you paid all at once at the end of the year RITA did not mind and would not charge a penalty.

Well, our friends in Lakewood's Tax Department office do care. So much so, in fact, that they sent me a bill stating that they are now seeking payment of the penalty that RITA never charged me for not paying in quarterly installments.

Unfortunately, I worked for the employer that never deducted for RITA for five years. So, Lakewood has charged me five years of late fees even though I paid all taxes owed by the April deadlines.

But they were just the nicest folks in the whole world when explaining to me this new retroactive late fee scheme for digging into my wallet. So polite.