The vote was unanimous at the September 24 meeting.
“We’ve gone through a number of exercises in the last two months to get where we (are),” said Commission Chairman Scott Schulte. “I don’t know if another exercise of that same scale is appropriate or not, but we’ll have to work on that. We have to come up with something if we want to reduce (the levy) from 4.97 percent.”
Schulte and county staff cited rising public safety, utility, and cyber security costs in the 2020 budget as reasons to seek an increase from year to year in tax revenue.
“I think (the increase) is responsible and reasonable,” said Schulte during the meeting. “If the levy ends up being 4.97 (percent) in December, I’m going to support it then as I do now. But I will work hand-in-hand, diligently, with every single one of you to see if we can find a way to save all our taxpayers those extra dollars.”
The final vote on the tax levy and budget plan will occur in December.
