Council surprised by its tax increase

Greg Harman

Tuesday, May 30, 2000 | 10:24 a.m.

Some Boulder City Council members were as surprised as the taxpayers they represent when they found out they had raised the city tax rate by a penny two weeks ago.

Now the council wants to revisit the fiscal year 2001 budget Wednesday at a special meeting called by Mayor Bob Ferraro.

Councilman Bill Smith requested the meeting after reading in the newspaper that the city had raised the tax rate.

"I didn't realize until I read it in the paper that we had raised the tax rate," Smith told the council at its last regular meeting.

Smith said that other council members were equally surprised that they had approved a tax rate increase.

"I didn't talk with any of them that knew we had raised the tax rate," Smith said.

When he confronted City Finance Director Bob Kenney, Smith said, he was told that the finance department had simply not raised the issue at recent budget hearings.

Kenney was attending a staff meeting Tuesday morning and could not be reached for comment.

The city's tax rate was approved at a May 16 budget hearing at 21.15 cents per $100 property valuation for fiscal year 2001, which begins July 1.

The increase is about one penny over this year's rate of 20.22 cents per $100 property valuation.

On a $100,000 home, that's an increase of about $3.30.

The expected $34.7 million in expenditures for fiscal 2001 budget grew over this year's $33.3 million. Meanwhile, the city's revenue dipped to $29.7 million between fiscal 2000 and fiscal 2001, a difference of about $500,000.