Voters reject quarter-cent tax behind $1.18 million in Torrington Progress Program grants

For 20 years, a quarter of a penny on each dollar spent in Goshen County has helped pay for storefront signs, repaved parking lots, firefighters’ breathing gear and a share of larger buildings. On Tuesday, voters decided not to continue it.

The quarter-cent economic development tax failed by 96 votes, 2,299 to 2,203, or 51.1% to 48.9%, according to unofficial results. The ballot asked whether the county should continue its 0.25% excise tax on goods and services for four more years, with the money going to the Goshen County Economic Development Corp. for economic development within the county.

This is the last in a series of stories on the Go Goshen Progress Program, which the tax paid for. The vote came after questions about how the campaign to renew it was funded, and after 16 years of grants in which Torrington recipients received more of the program’s money than any other community in the county.