Henry County residents should expect lower taxes next year

BY BROOKS TAYLOR

Mt. Pleasant News

County residents are going to like the fiscal 2017 Henry County budget.

They are going to like it because they will able to keep more money in their pocket. Both the urban and rural tax levies show over a $1 per $1,000 taxable valuation decrease.

Urban levy (levy paid by residents who live in the county communities) for the fiscal 2017 budget is $6.80 per $1,000 taxable valuation, compared with $7.94 for the current budget year. Meanwhile, the rural levy (levy paid by residents who live in the rural areas of the county) for 2017 is $10.75 per $1,000 taxable valuation as opposed to $11.89 for the fiscal 2016 budget.

The levies will garner the county $6,837,722 in tax revenue, down from $7,423,722 collected this fiscal year.

There are two major reasons for the decrease in the levy asking. The county is reducing its carryover balance and significantly less will be spent on mental health.

Shelly Barber, county auditor, said she strives to have an ending fund balance of 10-20 percent in the respective accounts of the budget and for the total budget and can easily accomplish that with the reduction in the tax levy.

Fiscal 2016?s $15.9M budget has a projected ending fund balance of $6.7 million. The fiscal 2017 budget calls for $16.8M in expenditures with an ending fund balance of $3.9M.

Barber also credited the fiscal responsibility shown by department heads in keeping down expenditures. ?All departments have not increased their budgets from year to year,? she said. ?Everybody keeps expenses down and they don?t pad their budgets. If they have money left in their budget, they don?t look for ways to spend it.?

Mental health spending will drop by $400,000 the next fiscal year. The county budgeted $1,136,892 for mental health this fiscal year and projects $731,864 in expenditures for fiscal 2017.

Part of the decrease is due to the regionalization of the mental health delivery system and a rather large carryover in the mental health account. ?We?re not levying anything for mental health next year because of a good ending balance,? Barber remarked. ?We can easily have a nice ending balance and pay for services without levying for it.?

Sarah Berndt, county coordinator of disability services/general assistance director, said the county currently has a $1.9M mental health fund balance, which is the primary reason for the decrease in the mental health budget.

She said that the county budgeted more for mental health in fiscal 2016 then needed because ?it was easier to make the money immediately available. If we would have had to increase the (mental health) budget, we would have needed to have a budget amendment.?

Berndt also added that the Southeast Iowa Link, the regional medical health group, ?has been tasked with starting new programs that have expensive start-up costs. We are not getting the programs developed as quickly as we thought we would. If we do get some developed, we have adequate money in the budget.?

An increase in valuation also plays into the reduced levy equation. Rural valuation increased $17 million while urban property valuation rose $12 million, Barber said. Total assessed valuation of the county is $783,065,671.

One of the largest increases in the budget is for roads and transportation. In fiscal 2016, the county budgeted expenditures of $4,495,140. In 2017, the figure rises to $5,277,508. However, the fiscal 2016 budget was filed before the 10-cent gas tax was signed into law. As a result of the gas tax increase, the county received approximately $450,000. The county also allocates $200,000 of its $800,000 in annual local option sales tax to the secondary roads department. Finally, some of the county?s road projects are partially funded by grants.

County Engineer Jake Hotchkiss has also planned several major construction projects this summer, the largest being the reconstruction of six miles of 220th Street east of Mt. Pleasant, which is estimated to cost $3.9 million. Work on Ash Avenue is estimated at another $430,000.

Barber said that a two-percent salary increase for county employees (other than elected officials and those covered under a union contract) is built into the budget. The county health-insurance premium also will be increasing by 2.5 percent.

The Henry County Board of Supervisors will host the public hearing on the fiscal 2017 budget at 10 a.m. Tuesday, March 1, in the supervisors? meeting room in the courthouse.