No, it’s not an April Fool’s joke. In an article about the proposed 8-cent real estate tax increase in Portsmouth, The Virginian-Pilot makes the mistake of reporting that the tax rate is per thousand of assessed value instead of per hundred, as clearly shown on the Portsmouth website.
Instead of a $14 increase on the average home as reported in the story, the rate increase would result in ten times that, or $140. The giveaway should have been the figure for the tax: in the sidebar (click to enlarge), the tax is shown as a total of $225.89. If the taxes in Portsmouth were that low, I think we’d all be clamoring to move there!
How in the heck could such a major mistake be made by the Pilot? Where are the infamous editors? Have they all been replaced with 16-year-olds who have never owned a home and for whom the $225.89 in real estate taxes sounded reasonable?
Which is worse? Bloggers with no editors or editors with no common sense?
Sadder still, though, is the fact that the error seemed to have escaped the notice of all but one of the commentors (as of this writing) on the article. What that says about the public is even worse.
Sigh. The blind leading the blind.
VIVIAN J. PAIGE | All Politics is Local 
You’d think a second-tier market would rate something better than a fourth-rate rag, but apparently that’s just not so.
Still, it’s sad knowing the Pilot likely will go under with most other papers. Weak as it is, it’s still so much better than the sad jokes that pass for “news” on local TV and radio.
I agree. I don’t want to see the Pilot disappear.