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City may reduce tax rate, increase fees
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| Deer Park City Manager Ronald V. Crabtree is going to propose a budget to the City Council at 5:30 p.m. Thursday. The city is likely to decrease the tax rate and increase water and sewer fees. |
By KOSAKU NARIOKA
The city of Deer Park is likely to reduce the tax rate from 0.72 percent to 0.705 percent while it is expected to increase water and sewer fees by 4 percent.
Ronald V. Crabtree, city manger, said the budget has its own set of challenges every year, but this year’s had “a bigger set of challenges” such as fuel cost increase, major investment to the information technology, major capital outlay requests, cost of living adjustments, drainage improvements yet a request of tax rate reduction from the council.
The 1.5 cents tax rate reduction per $100 of values is primarily related to the debt service fund, the city manage said.
Of the current 72 cents per $100 of value, 51.1 cents go to the general fund and 20.9 cents go to the debt service fund. The city is projecting to decrease the tax rate for the debt service fund by 1.5 cents to 19.4 cents.
Crabtree said the current tax rate for the debt service fund is “a little higher” to meet the current obligations and if the city needs to issue additional debt in the future, it will raise tax rate so it can meet the requirements.
The city’s debt service requirement for the next five years will peak at $3.3 million in the fiscal year 2009-10 and decline to $3.2 million in the fiscal year 2013-14.
To project future revenues, the city staff made an assumption that the taxable values are going to increase by 4 percent for the next couple of years and 3 percent after that.
The city manager noted the reduction of tax rate will affect the payments from the industrial district in lieu of taxes in the general fund as well.
Meantime, the city is expected to increase water and sewer fees up to 4 percent next year.
The total budget requests in the water and sewer fund amounted to $8.7 million and exceeded the estimated revenue of $8.2 million by about $470,000.
Besides the additional revenue through the fee increase, the city is expected to appropriate another $150,000 from the reserve in the water and sewer fund to meet the expenditures.
The city staff reduced the projected appropriation for waterline rehabilitation from $540,000 to $200,000, opted out the $300,000 emergency generator at the wastewater treatment plant and made other adjustments to the original budget request.
Crabtree is going to propose a budget for the fiscal year 2008-09 to the City Council on Thursday at 5:30 p.m.
Ronald V. Crabtree, city manger, said the budget has its own set of challenges every year, but this year’s had “a bigger set of challenges” such as fuel cost increase, major investment to the information technology, major capital outlay requests, cost of living adjustments, drainage improvements yet a request of tax rate reduction from the council.
The 1.5 cents tax rate reduction per $100 of values is primarily related to the debt service fund, the city manage said.
Of the current 72 cents per $100 of value, 51.1 cents go to the general fund and 20.9 cents go to the debt service fund. The city is projecting to decrease the tax rate for the debt service fund by 1.5 cents to 19.4 cents.
Crabtree said the current tax rate for the debt service fund is “a little higher” to meet the current obligations and if the city needs to issue additional debt in the future, it will raise tax rate so it can meet the requirements.
The city’s debt service requirement for the next five years will peak at $3.3 million in the fiscal year 2009-10 and decline to $3.2 million in the fiscal year 2013-14.
To project future revenues, the city staff made an assumption that the taxable values are going to increase by 4 percent for the next couple of years and 3 percent after that.
The city manager noted the reduction of tax rate will affect the payments from the industrial district in lieu of taxes in the general fund as well.
Meantime, the city is expected to increase water and sewer fees up to 4 percent next year.
The total budget requests in the water and sewer fund amounted to $8.7 million and exceeded the estimated revenue of $8.2 million by about $470,000.
Besides the additional revenue through the fee increase, the city is expected to appropriate another $150,000 from the reserve in the water and sewer fund to meet the expenditures.
The city staff reduced the projected appropriation for waterline rehabilitation from $540,000 to $200,000, opted out the $300,000 emergency generator at the wastewater treatment plant and made other adjustments to the original budget request.
Crabtree is going to propose a budget for the fiscal year 2008-09 to the City Council on Thursday at 5:30 p.m.
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