Thomas Breen photo
Board President Walker-Myers: Grant money not affected.
Alders voted unanimously to override the mayor’s veto of a tax increase reduction order, thereby requiring any “additional revenue” that the city receives for next year’s budget to go towards mitigating the new 11 percent tax hike.
During a special veto meeting held in the Aldermanic Chambers on the second floor of City Hall on Monday night, the full Board of Alders voted unanimously to overturn the veto that Mayor Toni Harp issued last week of an order that the alders had passed earlier in the month that sought to reduce next fiscal year’s tax increase.
The special veto meeting lasted around five minutes. The alders needed a two-thirds majority to override the mayor’s veto. They voted 25 to 0 in favor of the veto override. (Five alders were absent.)
The June 4 order, which the board also passed unanimously, states that “any additional revenue received for the 2018 – 19 Fiscal year shall only be used for mill rate reduction.”
At the end of May, the alders approved an amended version of the mayor’s proposed $547.1 million operating budget, thereby maintaining the original budget’s 11 percent tax increase for the fiscal year beginning July 1.
One mill corresponds to $1 in taxes for every $1,000 of assessed taxable real estate. The final approved budget raises the city’s real estate and personal property mill rate from 38.68 to 42.98. Taxpayers have received their new bills over the past week; many have expressed outrage.
Last week, the mayor vetoed the June 4 order. Her spokesperson, Laurence Grotheer, described the order as “unenforceable” as written, considering how much money comes into the city each year with specific strings attached. For example, he noted last week, if the state were to bump up the value of its Education Cost Sharing (ECS) grant to the city, the city could not simply take that money and use it to lower taxes. It would have to spend that money on education.
Although the alders’ veto override did not change the language of the original order, which still does not include any specified exceptions or qualifications to the term “additional revenue,” aldermanic leadership stated on Monday night that the mill rate reduction order would not redirect any incoming money that already has strings attached.
“It simply requires that any additional money that the city receives for the general fund be used for mill rate reduction,” said Westville/Amity/Beverly Hills Alder and Board of Alders Majority Leader Richard Furlow. “This does not apply to special funds. … Only the revenue that is coming to the general fund.”
The general fund is the city’s general operating budget, covering such expenses as city staff salaries and utility fees and department materials and supplies. The special fund budget covers state and federal grants specifically associated with certain time-limited projects or staff positions.
Alders at Monday night’s meeting.
Board of Alders President Tyisha Walker-Myers of West River confirmed that the order applies only to money coming in to the general fund, and only to additional revenue slated for next fiscal year, which begins on July 1.
“No grants,” she said about which money could be put towards the mill rate reduction. “No special funds.”
She said the order also applies specifically to next fiscal year, and will be in place for the duration of the year unless otherwise amended: that is, from July 1, 2018 through June 30, 2019.
So the $2 million that the Parking Authority transferred to the city last week is not necessarily affected by this order, as that money was given to the city during the current fiscal year, and the order that the mayor had vetoed and that the alders overrode applies to money received towards next fiscal year’s budget.
The mayor’s office has said that it plans to put that $2 million from the Parking Authority towards reducing the city’s projected $14 million budget deficit for the current fiscal year, and not towards reducing the 11 percent tax increase for next fiscal year.
However, since the legislative branch of city government has the final say over how all city money is spent, the alders will ultimately decide where the $2 million from the Parking Authority will go. The aldermanic Finance Committee, which discusses all matters related to city finances, next meets on July 9.
“The mayor expected the board’s override this evening,” Grotheer told the Independent after the alders had voted. “And certainly joins its members in a desire to do everything possible to mitigate the tax increase included in the budget adopted by the board.”
He said the alders’ on-the-record clarification that this order does not apply to special fund or grant dollars is more in line with what the mayor was hoping to see in Monday night’s vote.
Click on the Facebook Live video below to watch the full special veto meeting.