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Assessments
Will Drive BV Tax Rate Down
ARPA Funds Allocated To Pool Renovations
Buena Vista has a budget for the next fiscal year but not a real estate tax rate – the indication, though, is that the tax rate will be lowered from $1.27 to 91 cents per $100.
The 36-cent rate reduction would be an equalized tax rate to account for a 40 percent increase in property values due to reassessments. Charles Clemmer, the city’s finance director, told City Council this past Thursday that the reassessments have been completed, pending the outcome of potential challenges from property owners.
A Board of Equalization is to be appointed and seated in coming weeks to hear those challenges. Once this process is completed, City Council will set an equalized tax rate that will be reflected in bills that are due in December. Bills due June 5 were mailed out earlier in the month and are based on the $1.27 rate and pre-reassessment values.
Leaving aside the question of what the new equalized tax rate will be, City Council this past Thursday approved a budget for the upcoming fiscal year and appropriated funds for it.
The budget includes general fund expenditures of $16,510,954 – an increase of $1,020,107, or about 6.5 percent over this year. Local funding for the schools is set at 2,408,493, an increase of $114,690, or 4.8 percent.
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ontinued from page 1 The budget has funding for 5 percent pay raises for city employees. There is funding for two new police officers and a new position of marketing administrative assistant in the office of community development.
The Buena Vista library is being given funding of $193,810 – an increase of $46,483, or 31.6 percent – that will allow the library to reopen on Fridays so that it is open six days a week. The library has been closed on Fridays since the pandemic began. - City Council on Friday appropriated funds from the American Rescue Plan Act to address a couple of capital projects. ARPA funding of $650,000 was approved for renovations to the municipal swimming pool at Glen Maury Park and $105,000 for gas monitoring equipment at the wastewater treatment plant.
