Wheaton council agrees to abate a portion of tax levy
Despite an initial tie vote, the Wheaton city council came to a compromise Monday and voted 6-0 to abate a portion of the 2015 property tax levy.
In December, the city council approved its first increase to the property tax levy in five years.
The agreement at the time was to increase taxes to provide an additional $471,000 to police and fire pensions and an additional $300,000 to general fund revenues.
It was estimated that the owner of a $300,000 home would pay about an additional $41 to the city in fiscal year 2016.
However, city staff agreed to review the need for that extra revenue in mid-March, after a draft of the 2016-17 budget was completed.
City Manager Don Rose said the draft budget was prepared without the extra $300,000 for the general fund. He recommended that the council abate the $300,000, but keep the $471,000 for pensions.
"That is an area of the budget that obviously has increased fairly significantly and I think as a protection for the city over what might happen in the next several years it would be a wise decision to go ahead and leave that amount of money in the levy," he said. "That decision is entirely up to you."
Mayor Michael Gresk, Councilman Phil Suess and Councilwoman Suzanne Fitch said they wanted to abate both increases, which would have reduced the total levy from $16.6 million to $15.8 million.
"We went through the budget process. There was not one thing that we said we weren't going to be able to do because we didn't have enough money," Suess said. "There is no need to increase taxes."
State Rep. Jeanne Ives of Wheaton also spoke at the meeting in support of abating the levy by about $771,000.
"It still says a lot when a city is able to find the wherewithal to keep taxes as flat as possible," she said. "In fact, that gives you a really good argument from the state level to say, 'You can't take our funds, we've been very good to our property taxpayers, we've been very good at limiting what that increase is, in fact, we've keep it at zero even during tough times. We need every money possible.'"
However, Councilmen Todd Scalzo, John Prendiville and John Rutledge said they agreed with Rose's recommendation.
"We can do our best to control our little corner of the world here and when the state does make a decision then we can react, but under this uncertainty I think the more prudent course is to become more independent of the state," Scalzo said.
The council first voted to abate both increases Monday. It ended in a 3-3 vote, as Councilman Thor Saline was absent. Suess asked to table the issue, but with the deadline for abatement a week away, the council went ahead with an unanimous vote to only abate the $300,000 for the general fund.