Another Tax Increase Brewing
June/15/2010 06:46
At the June 15th Shores council meeting, a public hearing will be held to consider the 2010/2011 budget and the property tax millage rate. Word coming out of the finance committee is that yet another property tax millage increase is forthcoming.
At the finance committee last week, Mayor Cooper and his slate of cronies refused to consider around $ 500,000 of budget cuts proposed by Finance chair Ted Kedzierski. The council voted 5-2 to raise the city property tax millage another 0.7 mils. Only council member Dan Schulte joined Ted in voting against the millage increase. If Councilman Kedzierski's proposals were adopted, a millage increase could be averted, and the city would also end up with a healthier fund balance at the end of the next fiscal year.
After the incumbents raised taxes last year, contrary to the public sentiments expressed at the last budget hearing, Shores residents were promised that the city administration would “hit the ground running” and deal with the city’s budgetary crisis. Now here we are a full year later, and it appears that it is business as usual at city hall. The excuse proffered at the last finance committee meeting as that the incumbents were tied up with the recall. Yet isn’t having the city budget prepared in a timely and effective manner the responsibility of both our highly compensated city manager and the finance director?
Both the recent recall campaign from which Mayor Cooper and the remaining incumbents escaped by the narrowest of margins, and the recent city survey should have sent a clear message that taxpayers are not happy with the city’s solution of trying to solve our fiscal problems by raising taxes. The survey results were very unequivocal- only 15% of residents said they are willing to pay more property taxes to preserve services at current levels. Yet Mr. Kedzierski’s well thought out proposals to cut administrative costs at city hall were systematically shot down by Mayor Cooper and his incumbent and appointed cronies.
Something is clearly afoul when the city administration seems more concerned about "the moral of the municipal employees" than they are with looking out for what is best for the taxpayers they are supposed to represent. Shores residents are intelligent enough to understand that city services need not be drastically cut if excessive administrative and legacy costs were trimmed. How much would residents suffer if the administrative offices at city hall were only open four days a week, a simple cost cutting measure other local municipalities have utilized?
If Shores council votes to raise the tax rate again on Tuesday, they will have done nothing to solve the underlying root problems of a government that has consistently spent more money than it has taken in, to the tune of having depleted $2.5 million dollars in reserve funds over the past few years. Review the graphic portrayal of the city finances as contained in the Grosse Pointe Shores Informed Taxpayers Newsletter #2. Both the magnitude of Shores deficit spending and the reasons why the state has placed the Shores under fiscal watch during the Cooper era are clear.
The council’s failure to effectively address the unsustainable legacy costs that the Cooper regime has burdened taxpayers with over the last decade will only defer the pain that will be passed on to Shores taxpayers for years to come. Yet another millage increase will bring us ever closer to the 20-mil property tax limit that the Cooper regime foisted on unsuspecting city residents with the phony promise that this charter provision was for dire emergencies that may occur well into the future.
I certainly hope that there will be a large turnout of concerned Shores residents willing to speak their mind at the budget hearing on Tuesday night. It is clear that the message sent both by the recall campaign and the city survey has fallen on deaf ears.
Depending on how things turn out on Tuesday night, a group of concerned Shores citizens plan to meet in the very near future to consider our future strategy, planning to continue the momentum gained during the recent recall campaign. If you are interested in participating, or have any thoughts to share, please let me know using the contact form on the last page of the web site.