Property owners to see tax savings
By Jason Arndt
Editor
Upon further review of its adopted budget, Twin Lakes village officials discovered higher than anticipated growth, among other items.
The higher than anticipated growth, in addition to the village’s revaluation and building activity, forced the Village Board to amend the budget and tax levy at a savings to taxpayers during a Dec. 6 special meeting.
“Basically, I was filling out our levy limit worksheet and we experienced quite a bit of growth this last year,” said Village Administrator Jennifer Frederick.
After Frederick completed the worksheet, she discovered the initially adopted budget exceeded the maximum allowable by state law.
The amended budget consists of a village tax levy, excluding the library portion, of $3,480,048 and a mill rate of $4.796 per $1,000 of assessed property value.
The two figures are a decrease from the budget passed on Nov. 19.
Previously, the budget adopted at the Nov. 19 board meeting showed a village only tax levy of $3,752,048 and mill rate of $5.14.
Frederick told the village board tax bills have not been sent out to property owners under the previously adopted budget.
While the village-only tax levy and mill rate changed, the library levy remained the same for both budgets at $271,082.
Total assessed valuation, meanwhile, stayed the same between the adopted budget passed on Nov. 19 and the amended budget at $782,102,300. The assessed valuation is an increase from 2018, when the village had an assessed valuation of $710,145,400.
Reduction of expenses
The amended budget forced the village to reduce its expenses by $272,000 with the building maintenance fund seeing the biggest decrease.
Under the budget passed on Nov. 19, the village decided to place $200,000 in the fund to help finance a future village hall, but needed to remove $182,000 from the amended budget.
The other two reductions from the Nov. 19 budget involved a $50,000 cut from road maintenance funding and another $40,000 for capital outlay.
To balance the budget, the village reduced expected revenue from a property tax settlement by $272,000.