Rural and urban tax rate adjustment vexes citizens at hearing

The City of Wyoming Truth in Taxation hearing last week attracted about 20 or so residents, who threw questions to staff and elected council members in an hour-long hearing. The difficult concept to grasp was how the city levy can remain exactly the same as it was last year but some peoples’ tax bills are going up. The main concern was from former township property owners, seeing anywhere from a 30 to 50 percent proposed tax increase described in their tax mailer. The former township was annexed into urban Wyoming under an agreement establishing a five year graduated property tax hike.

Township parcels’ 2014 tax bill incorporates the final year of these adjustments, to get them to the same rate as urban district property owners. For the last four years incoming township parcels had two years at 50 percent, 60 percent, 70 and now 100 percent of valuation considered in calculating property tax. The difficult thing for council to explain is that Wyoming is not collecting more revenue for 2014-- rather it’s the way it is being collected. The burden is “redistributed” said Mayor Eric Peterson. Township residents stated there is no justification for the hike in their taxes. Municipal “services” haven’t benefited those in the township zone, they said. Council said public works had to expand when the city got bigger. Police services expanded to provide patrol, response and equipment to an area that had no contracted law enforcement and used to see a sheriff’s car periodically. John O’Neal said the city can’t keep “taxing us to death.” He said his property tax was projected to go up 44 percent.

Judy Coughlin added, “It is a hit. We’re really not getting a lot.” Council member Steve Zerwas said he’s a former township resident and, “...my taxes went up too...it was part of the agreement.” City Administrator Craig Mattson also noted that in 2017 a couple of major JOBZ subsidized business developments will come onto the tax rolls and provide some relief. The potential new revenue is approximately $300,000 (at current commercial/industrial rates.) Resident Steve Sicheneder told council he wanted to see tighter budgeting. If the item is budgeted for, it should be necessary and should show in audits as an expenditure. He said there have been substantial “underbudget” items in the last few years. Wyoming has been building reserves from undesireable balances earlier to levels that benefit its financial standing, staff explained. Also, sometimes money must be shifted, when there’s an over-run in uncontrollable expenses like fuel or public works repairs.

There are discretionary (mowing, etc.) and mandated things that the city provides. Wyoming council looks at the budget based on priority. The levy the council ended up adopting for 2014 is less than the preliminary amount printed on mailed tax information. The September number council had preliminarily approved was $4.1 million. The council voted 5-0 last week on a $3.9 million levy. The levy for 2013 was exactly the same. The 2014 levy also still includes $500,000 for the special savings account that was designed to pay off road reconstruction bonds. The bonding plan was denied by city voters this fall. Council is still reviewing revisions to the roadwork assessments policy for reconstruction. Brand new roads are always going to be paid for 100 percent by the abutting landowner/developer -- but reconstruction assessments remain elusive.

The idea behind the bond sale was to eliminate assessments and use the half-million to service debt. The money is now no longer earmarked for bonded indebtedness. There’ll be a little over $1 million in the account by next year-- but council said there are no street projects chosen to be on deck yet for 2014. In other matters: there was some give-and-take reviewing a promotion policy and process as requested by Police Chief and Public Safety Director Paul Hoppe. He proposes to fill the sergeant vacancy (end of the year when Scott Dexter retires) by promoting from within. Council members Joe Zerwas and Steve Zerwas came at this citing their years of law enforcement experience.

They opposed any promotion policy emphasizing a four-year degree. Both said they didn’t want this in policy as “mandatory” for an interview committee to consider. Chief Hoppe described it as a “preference” but not “mandatory.” The four-year degree reference is to gauge the level of effort a candidate has put into his career development only. Hoppe expects whomever is promoted to take advantage of supervisory skills training made available to departments. After tweaking the requested policy wording-- making it clear a four-year degree is not a condition of promotion-- the chief got the go-ahead, on a 5-0 vote.

There’s a retirement send-off for Dexter in February, probably at Stella’s in Forest Lake, details will be announced closer to the event. ~ Council authorized hiring part time Officer Michael Tadych as full time. Starting wage is $24.40 and he begins Dec 30. ~ Council okayed conditional plans for a 63,000 square foot storage facility for Hallberg Inc. at 26192 Fallbrook. (See graphic.) Impervious surface, setbacks and fire controls are being revised to meet staff recommendations, and the applicant is agreeable.