On Monday, Cornelius will move one step closer to a new tax rate
Photo by Jason Benavides
May 12. By Dave Vieser. It doesn’t appear that Cornelius commissioners will be under any neighborhood pressure to adopt a revenue neutral budget. Town managers in both Davidson and Huntersville have proposed tax rates which are above revenue neutral.
What is revenue neutral?
Revenue neutral is when a taxing jurisdiction budgets the exact same amount of property tax revenue, in dollars, for the upcoming budget year as they did for the current year. It’s a big deal when tax assessments go up, as they did this year in Mecklenburg County. Theoretically it gives governing bodies a chance to apply lower tax rates while raising the same amount of revenue due to higher tax values. In reality, it doesn’t occur very often.
What about Cornelius?
Town Manager Andrew Grant will unveil his proposed budget this Monday evening May 15. Previous discussions with the town commissioners suggest that the proposed tax rate will probably be a penny above revenue neutral, down from 2 cents in the first public draft. The elephant in the room is the county, which comprises about 70 percent of a property owner’s tax bill. Mecklenburg County’s budget will be released May 18, and indications are that it won’t be a revenue neutral affair either.
Of course these are just proposed budgets and tax rates. Elected officials in each municipality have the ability to change the tax rates, perhaps lowering them to a revenue neutral level, before the spending plans must be adopted July 1.
Anyone taking odds?
The Cornelius Town Board Meeting on May 15 will begin at 6 pm in Town Hall on Catawba Avenue. It will also be lived streamed on the town website: www.cornelius.nc
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Who do we contact to express our opinion? I’d prefer we pursue revenue neutral.
Website has an email that goes to all commissioners. But in a year where we had 8% inflation it’s impossible to provide same service without at least a penny increase. Remember Cornelius tax is only 30% of your tax bill. The county tax rate is a far bigger issue in my mind.
False. It’s always frustrating when the media gets Revenue Neutral wrong. It is NOT the rate that provides the same revenue as last year. It provides for GROWTH in Revenue equal to the average of the last 4 years, by law. The idea is that if we set a Revenue Neutral tax rate, we are not increasing taxes on citizens, but we are providing for ordinary Revenue growth needed to pay for services.
And a 1 penny rate increase, which sounds innocuous, is really a 6% average increase in tax bills for our citizens. Totally unnecessary this year if we can simply control the growth in our spending to something reasonable like the growth of our population plus inflation.
Mayor Washam responds: While the State’s calculation for revenue neutral does not factor in valuation change, it does allow for natural growth in assessed values due to activities such as adding on to your house or building upon a vacant piece of property; however, Cornelius’ natural growth has been extremely modest at best.
Unfortunately, the property tax revenues that are generated by the Town’s modest natural growth is simply not enough to keep pace with the many priorities identified by the citizens of our Town, such as Transportation, Police & Fire, and Parks. There are over $50 million of road project funding needed to improve transportation in our town, including widening West Catawba Ave. and rebuilding Jetton Rd. Extension to improve its safety and add improved bicycle & pedestrian facilities. The Town’s outdated 1950s model of relying upon volunteer & contracted part-time firefighters is no longer sustainable, and it is well past time to transition to a full-time career department. This is required to provide reliable and minimum industry standards of recommended staffing levels to respond to all fire & rescue emergencies 24/7. Due to recent catastrophic shootings that have occurred at our nation’s elementary schools, we must add School Resource Officers at our two CMS elementary schools, JV Washam and Cornelius Elementary Schools, who would be sworn Cornelius Police Dept. Officers. Park has deferred maintenance projects, greenway and multi-use path construction, and park capital improvement projects, like expanding tennis & pickleball at Bailey Road Park, etc. We must stop kicking these cans down the road. Hundreds of citizens are compassionate that these projects for our community be provided. Finally, the salaries for the Town’s Police Officers, Firefighters, Maintenance Technicians, and many other employees must keep pace with the labor market, as it is imperative to the Town’s expected service levels. We must retain & recruit qualified & talented professionals that protect us and are on the front lines of our town operations. Like any other organization (public or private), it takes resources to fund all these priorities that thousands of citizens have identified as important to them. These items cost money and are certainly not free. A 1 cent increase over revenue neutral on our average home value of $686,963 would cost $68.70.
—Woody Washam, mayor of Cornelius
I wish Mecklenburg county and Cornelius would both develop a lower tax rate for seniors. It is getting so difficult to maintain my home and pay the property taxes. As seniors we now have to try and hire help with our maintenance like mowing, painting, repairs. We use to do these things but are not physically capable anymore. So our cost is way up. Just a note…. If you having seniors in your community and you complain they’re not taking care of their yards. How about getting your kids to offer some help. It would teach your children empathy and responsibility on their way to adulthood. 😀
One would think the additional tax revenues from new properties going onto the tax rolls in a fast growing area such as ours would go a long way toward enabling local and county governments to budget without raising taxes on established businesses and homeowners, but it never seems to work that way.
High density housing does not even come close to covering cost increases to city. It’s actually the worst thing you can do if u want lower taxes.
Quoting the town manager, “budget decisions are amongst the most important actions of a town board.” It’s important to understand this is an annual process, so just like a prudent household budget, both short and long term planning should be flexible based on revenue and financial circumstances. The town should invest to provide the expected level of services and reduce the urge to overspend in times of excess.