By Brenda Erdahl:
Commissioners approved an $87,257,925 levy at the Sept. 28 Wright County Board meeting which represents a 5.75 percent increase over last year’s budget.
While no one likes to see an increase, Wright County Administrator Lee Kelly testified that County staff worked hard to keep the number as low as possible. The 5.75 increase is actually half of what initially came to the table.
“We started out with a close to 12 percent (increase) and whittled that down quite a bit,” Kelly said.
The final number is the result of nine days of budget meetings at both the staff and board level.
Kelly said that during the process they tried to be mindful of property values going up, knowing that other jurisdictions, beside the County, come into play when it comes to residents’ individual property taxes.
“I think we took an effort here to keep ours as flat as possible, from the County’s portion, while still balancing that we capture the new growth in the County,” Kelly said.
Wright County is the third fastest growing county in the state over the last 10 years. The new construction growth of 6.6 percent exceeds the 5.75 percent levy increase, which means, with the exception of some properties going up in value, in many cases, the amount of the county property tax will remain the same with the increase offset by more parcels coming on the tax rolls.
According to Kelly, once approved by the board, the levy can’t increase from that point forward.
In addition to approving the levy, Commissioners set Dec. 9 at 6 p.m. as the annual Truth in Taxation hearing.
To read what else was discussed at the board meeting, turn to page 3 of this week’s Maple Lake Messenger.