Liverpool tax rates will go down slightly if the Village Board of Trustees approves a proposed $2,625,665 budget for 2012-13.
At its monthly meeting March 19, the trustees heard a brief presentation from Village Clerk/Treasurer Mary Ellen Sims, who outlined the new spending plan.
If the budget is approved as expected later this month, the tax rate for village property owners will go down by 15 cents per $1,000 of assessed value. In 2011-12, the rate was set at $12.40 per $1,000 of valuation, but for 2012-13, it would stand at $12.25 per $1,000 of valuation.
Village residents and business owners are invited to comment on the proposed budget at a public hearing set for 7:01 p.m. April 9, at the Village Hall, 310 Sycamore St.
“Our department heads have been astute and creative as far as living within their budgets,” said Mayor Gary White. “We tried to reduce the rate as much as possible.”
In 2011-12, a home assessed at $100,000 received a village tax bill of $1,240. If the proposed 2012-13 budget is approved with the tax rate set at $12.25 per thousand, the same property owner would pay $1,225. All properties in the village must also pay a $150-per unit sewer rent charge.
No major capital projects are planned for the coming year, Sims said. The proposed budget pays for village departments of public works, police, village court, clerks, codes enforcement and the operation of the Village Hall as well as $197,255 in debt payments for general fund.
“By 2014, our debt payments will be significantly lower,” Sims predicted. “We will have paid off almost all our notes except for the sewer bond, which will have an outstanding balance of $1,670,000 at that time.”
The proposed budget is $403,000 higher than the previous year’s budget, but is still more than $125,000 lower than the 2009-10 budget which came in at $2,746,962.
In 2010, Onondaga County significantly cut funds previously shared with the smaller governments when it changed its long-standing sales-tax agreement with towns and villages, so the village pared down its budget that year to $2,194,000.
Because of the loss of sales tax revenue, village taxes were raised for the first time in 14 years last year, although the total budget was just $2,223,428. Village taxes went up by approximately 22 percent, but that hike was offset somewhat by a decrease in the county tax rate.
“We were pleasantly surprised that year when our employees stepped up and suspended their agreed-upon salary increases, raises which were contractually guaranteed,” White said. “That helped the village weather its sudden loss.”
Over the past decade, the village had received about $550,000 annually from the county’s 4 percent sales tax. Over the next 10 years Liverpool will get just $281,000 per year. That’s its share of $4 million annually which the county will distribute among its 15 villages as part of a new Village Infrastructure Program.
