Village OKs slightly higher levy

Tax rate is falling but reassessment of property will determine if residents see lower bills
By 
MITCH MAERSCH
Ozaukee Press Staff

The Belgium Village Board unanimously approved the 2019 tax levy, general fund budget on Monday.

Nobody spoke at a public hearing on the budget before the meeting.

The levy is $1,062,950, a .54% increase over last year’s $1,057,212.

The tax rate is estimated to be $7.22 per $1,000 of assessed value, meaning the owner of a $200,000 home would pay $1,444 in village taxes in 2019.

That is 13 cents less than last year, but it doesn’t necessarily equate to a tax decrease.

“There’s no way to say that nobody’s taxes are going to go up. If your assessment went up, your taxes will go up,” Village Treasurer Vickie Boehnlein said at last month’s meeting of the  Committee of the Whole, which is the entire Village Board operating as a committee.

Most property values, she said, are about where they were in 2014, before everyone’s assessments dropped in 2015.

The committee unanimously recommended approval of the budget, 5-0. Josh Borden and Dale Pfeifer were absent.

On Monday, the vote was 6-0. Pfeifer, who recently survived a fellow trustee’s charge to force his resignation due to lack of attendance at board and committee meetings, was absent.

The village had to determine how to handle a rarity in the budget — an excess of nearly $7,500 in revenue.

“This is a problem we haven’t had since I’ve been on the board,” said Boehnlein, who served as a trustee and board president for several years.

Two contributing factors to the scenario were a drop in the village’s debt service and a bump from new construction.

“We’re not even having to cut (the budget),” Boehnlein said.

To handle the surplus, the committee recommended not levying to the maximum amount allowed by the state but not cutting the budget either.

Included in the budget is a 2% wage increase for village employees and a 3% increase for the Department of Public Works superintendent.

Also included is $5,000 for two speed signs that residents requested in order to slow traffic coming into the village and $600 for two Little Free Libraries at the request of a resident concerned with the lack of access to books for children and village residents.

The general fund budget is $1,269.464.97.

 

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Wisconsin’s largest paid circulation community weekly newspaper. Serving Port Washington, Saukville, Grafton, Fredonia, Belgium, as well as Ozaukee County government. Locally owned and printed in Port Washington, Wisconsin.

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