2016 budget expected to be announced Tuesday

The 2016 Cache County budget is expected to be announced at the county council meeting at 5 p.m. tonight. If the budget is not approved, the council will call a special meeting to finalize the budget before the end of the year. 

This year’s budget process has been particularly contentious due to a general property tax increase and the adoption of a new municipal service tax to cover a deficit made larger by proposed salary increases for the county council and elected officials. 

At the Dec. 1 meeting, the council denied increases for county council and elected official salaries and rejected a new municipal service tax.

“I don’t think the municipal service tax is a fair tax,” said Jon White, a council member. “I would rather see us raise everyone’s property taxes to 6.2 percent and be done with it.”

Originally, the council released a public statement stating the general property tax rate would not exceed 6.24 percent. In recent meetings, the proposed property tax rate was at 4.19 percent while the municipal service tax was on the table. Once the municipal service tax was rejected, the council discussed raising the general property tax above the publicly announced cap of 6.24 percent to cover the deficit. 

“Both of these taxes have been a moving target from the first time we heard about them,” said Val Potter, a council member. “They keep changing and evolving, and that’s frustrating.” 

“This is a part of the budget process and we do this every year,” said Craig Buttars, the county executive. “I’ll admit that the initial tax proposal that went out to the public was not a good target, but we had to send that out and say that is the maximum that we would tax.” 

If the council chooses to raise the general property tax rate above 6.24 percent at today’s meeting, the proposed budget would need to be adjusted again before it can be completed and announced by the council. 

Other items on the agenda for today’s meeting include: 

• UAC Report from Lincoln Shurtz and Adam Trupp. 

• Public Hearing – Requesting a rezone of a 0.69 acre portion of 73.69 acres in the resort recreation zone to include the public Infrastructure overlay zone, located at the Cache / Weber County line, Powder Mountain.

• Public hearing for the open 2015 budget.

• Adoption of 2016 Cache County budget. 

The meeting is in the Cache County Historic Courthouse, County Council Chambers, 199 N. Main Street, Logan.