30.8 F
West Bend

GUEST EDITORIAL | West Bend School District Levies 7.17% Tax Increase | By Owen Robinson

October 7, 2019 – West Bend, WI – I see a story in the Washington County Daily News today where the West Bend School District has returned to the cloudy language of taxes.

WEST BEND — Good news for property owners in the West Bend Joint School District: the budget is balanced and the mill rate — read: taxes — will not increase from last year.

The district’s mill rate will remain $7.97 per $1,000 of assessed value. Thus the owner of a home valued at $203,000, for example, will pay $1,617.91 in taxes to the district.

There are several factors behind the district’s decision not to raise taxes.

West Bend is a low spending district, and was awarded an extra $299 per student in state aid for the coming year. It does have declining enrollment…

 

This is the game that the school district and other taxing bodies like to play. They try to pretend that the mill rate is equivalent to tax burden. It is not. For several years, after a lot of public discussion, we finally got the West Bend School District to stop doing this. It looks like they have returned to their old ways.

Here’s the deal… taxes are the total money extracted from the taxpayers to pay for the school district. It is a simple calculation. If the district decides that they want to extract $40 million from the taxpayers through a property tax levy. They simply divide that amount into the aggregate property values to derive the tax rate – called the mill rate. When it comes to discussing the tax burden, the mil rate and the property values are irrelevant. The tax levy is everything.

In this case, despite receiving an increase in state aid, the West Bend School District is increasing property taxes by 7.17%.

Last year, the school district levied $39,174,600. This year, they are going to levy $41,983,435. That is a 7.17% increase in taxes no matter how you slice it.

The school district is celebrating that they kept the mill rate flat, but that is only because property values in the district have increased thanks to the good economy. They are simply raising taxes at about the same pace as property values are increasing, thus keeping the rate flat.

Why does this matter?

It matters because, despite the proclamations of the school district, the tax burden is increasing in a school district with declining enrollment. For example, let’s say you are a senior on a fixed income living in a house that was valued at $200,000. Your property taxes for the school district was $1,594 last year. After a reassessment, your house is now valued at $218,000. Even though the school district is keeping the mill rate the same, now your property taxes for the school district will be $1,737.46 – a $143.46 increase. Your income didn’t increase. You don’t derive any value from the increased property value unless you sell your house. But you are paying more. Yes, your taxes went up despite the district maintaining a flat tax rate.

The mill rate in meaningless. The levy is everything. And however they want to spin it, the West Bend School District will increase property taxes 7.17% in a single year.

Credit to …. you can choose to click HERE to read the rest on the story.

 

By Owen Robinson

 

 

Disclaimer: Opinions and letters published in http://www.washingtoncountyinsider.com are not necessarily the views of the Editor, or Publisher. The http://www.washingtoncountyinsider.com reserves the right to edit or omit copy, in accordance with newspaper policies. Letters to the Editor must be attributed with a name, address and contact phone number – names and town of origin will be printed, or may be withheld at the Editor’s discretion. During the course of any election campaign, letters to the editor dealing with election issues or similar material must contain the author’s name and street address (not PO Box) for publication.

 

London : W. Foulsham & Co., [1918]

WCCOMMENTING RULES OF ETIQUETTE:

While open and honest debate is encouraged here, Washington County Insider asks that you comply with the following rules for posting. Those who do not comply will have their posts removed and may result in being banned from commenting.

Washington County Insider will not publish comments that:

  • Are considered likely to provoke, attack or offend others. This is known as “trolling.” Trollers know when they are trolling, and so do we. *See definition of “troll” below. If you notice a few consistent blog trolls disappear, you’ll know why.
  • Are sexually explicit, abusive or otherwise objectionable.
  • Contains inappropriate or vulgar language that is likely to offend.
  • Break the law or condone or encourage unlawful activity. This includes breach of copyright, defamation and contempt of court.
  • Advertise products or services for profit.
  • Are seen to impersonate someone else.
  • Repeatedly post the same or similar messages (‘spam’)
  • Include personal contact details such as telephone numbers and postal or email addresses.
  • Include a link or photo that has not been approved by the editor prior to posting.
  • Are considered campaigning. See also “trolling” above.
  • Are unrelated to the topic.

NOTES:

  • Just because your comment doesn’t show up right away doesn’t mean you’re being censored. When you post a comment it must first go through our filtering software. If it fails, your comment goes into a queue for manual approval.
  • Just because a comment or advertisement is on the site, doesn’t mean WCI endorses it.
  • The above rules are not intended to stop criticism or dissenters, but rather to stop those who are incapable of participating in a civilized manner.

*Trolling: troll is a person who sows discord on the Internet by starting arguments or upsetting people, by posting inflammatory,[1] extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community (such as a newsgroup, forum, chat room, or blog) with the intent of provoking readers into an emotional response[2] or of otherwise disrupting normal, on-topic discussion,[3] often for the troll’s amusement. (source: Wikipedia)

 

Graphic courtesy Owego Pennysaver Press

1 COMMENT

  1. How in the world can young and assumed intelligent people not understand basic economics
    This is a death sentence to the future
    I know you want Taj Mahal but seriously at the cost of everyone else
    Come on
    Would this work for you on your home mortgage
    Come on
    Stop thinking it’s someone else’s problem as long as you look good
    Do what’s right
    Come on

Leave a Reply

Work or the content on WashingtonCountyInsider.com cannot be downloaded, printed, or copied. The work or content on WashingtonCountyInsider.com prohibits the end user to download, print, or otherwise distribute copies.

Subscribe

FREE local news at Washington County Insider on YouTube

Related Articles