TPRTA Survey of Truro Part-Time Resident Taxpayers

July 2024

SUMMARY of RESULTS

In June 2024, TPRTA conducted our periodic survey of Truro’s part-time resident taxpayers to get your views on key current issues and to hear from you about your concerns and priorities, especially for TPRTA and the  Select Board.

We are also sharing this with TPRTA Members and subscribers, the Select Board and Town Management, and the larger community, including  the Town’s newly re-established Part-Time Resident Advisory Committee which (as a non-representative Committee) can advise the Select Board on official positions on policy and practices concerning part-timers.

About the Survey

At the time the survey was closed, we received responses1 from 665 households representing the views of 1850 part-time resident taxpayers and property owners. This represents a nearly 30% increase in responses from our last survey in 2021. To our knowledge, it is also the largest survey to have been conducted in Truro and it is consistent with the past year’s significant increase in the engagement of full-time residents and an energized participation of Truro voters. The entire community of Truro has become more active, attentive, and engaged in 2023-24, and likely will stay so going forward.

Results/Highlights

• Part-time resident taxpayers hold Truro in high regard, with deep connections and genuine enthusiasm, expressing appreciation for the people and for the “place” – all that Truro is on the ground. Truro is significant to us, not a pit-stop, throw away, or corporate investment opportunity. As a practical matter, this means we are a resource and a force for good – engaged and prepared to do more if welcomed and encouraged.
• The survey obtained an exceptionally high response rate – almost twice the number of voters who elected Town officials in 2024 and almost triple the number who voted at 2024 Town Meetings (i.e., about 625 at the high points).
• Part-timers trust and rely upon TPRTA to serve as advocate and most relied-upon information source about Truro and to continue to work with Town officials, the newly re-constituted Town Committee concerning part-timers, and with the community as a whole.
• Part-time resident taxpayers continue to spend considerable time in Truro – five to seven months equivalent annually on average – without proportionately increasing our use of Town services. We have become an increasingly large and continuous presence in Truro, bolstering business, cultural organizations, non-profits and the Town with support as clients, donors, patrons, volunteers, and as full-time taxpayers.
• Part-timers affirmed and confirmed that our interests as taxpayers and residents are largely mutual and overlapping with full-timers, based on 2024 voter decisions. We should seek ways to align our interests and efforts and to cooperate even more extensively for the benefit of all.
• Part-timers affirmed their support for attainable housing in scale with the Truro community’s needs, for protection of water quality in groundwater and embayments, and for preserving Truro’s rural character as a life choice and as a driver of the Truro economy. These are consistent with the views expressed by voters in 2024 Town meetings and elections.
• Part-timers also share voters’ concern over the rapidly escalating rates of taxes, spending and budgets as well inter-account transfers without consistent voter approval; we call for the Select Board and the Town Manger to use restraint and exercise greater transparency going forward. 
• Part-timers still express unwavering opposition to the RTE (Residential Tax Exemption) seven years after its adoption and call for it to be phased out over several years starting in the next fiscal year.
• Part-timers support tax relief to those who need it through equitable taxpayer-supported benefits, abatements and other tax policy provided the cost basis is shared among all taxpayers evenly –  and that benefits are either all needs-based or none are needs-based.
• Except for the RTE, there is general unity of vision and methods with full-timers on how to make and keep Truro a rural community we can all enjoy, support, and cherish for generations.  A clear set of priorities we encourage the Select Board to address and for TPRTA to advocate have been laid out in the full report.
• Part-timers are aware of and paying attention to the myriad central issues facing Truro and have the best interests of Truro as a whole forefront.
• Part-timers share full-timers’ concerns about the trustworthiness of Town government and the manner in which some in Town government handled voter registration challenges, engaged in perceived voter suppression efforts, handled budget and spending, and in other ways failed to protect and support the taxpayers of Truro.
• Part-timers want a real say in how we are taxed and how the Town operates and urge the Select Board to be more proactive in achieving equitability and fairness. The Select Board should also consider whether it really sees part-time resident taxpayers as their citizens or as subjects upon whom they can impose targeted policies, fees and/or taxes.

You can read the full TPRTA 2024 Survey Report here