Geneva school board considers raising tax levy

The Geneva school district once again is considering asking for all the property taxes it can get in its proposed 2011 levy request.

Monday night the school board published a proposed levy request of $77.84 million. If preliminary estimates of the district’s property values hold true, it would mean an increase of about 42 cents per $100, to a total tax rate of $5.67. On a $288,000 market-value house, district officials estimate the school tax bill would increase $403 per year. The county clerk won’t determine the final equalized assessed valuation until March.

While the state’s tax-cap law limits increasing the levy on most properties by no more than 1.5 percent this year, that limit does not apply to the tax rate for new properties.

The board must approve a levy by Dec. 27 for collection in spring 2012. It is unlikely the district will receive every dollar for which it asks.

That part was straightforward, typical of what has to be done every year. But the district’s assistant superintendent for business, Donna Oberg, also laid out options the board could choose to bring that rate down using combinations of bond refinancing, abatements, pushing some debt out an extra year and spending some of the district’s reserves. The board has until March to decide if it wants to abate any of the levy.

“I do want to make it clear that no matter what option we choose, tax rates are going to increase and tax bills are going to increase,” Oberg said.

The board last month discussed a financial analyst’s opinion that the district could afford to spend about $11 million of its reserves to pay down money it had borrowed to build new elementary schools and remodel and enlarge other schools in the early to mid 2000s.

“I don’t care what option we take, we built buildings, we passed referendums and we have to pay that mortgage back,” Oberg said.

Resident Bob McQuillan, who has gone toe-to-toe with the board over finances, had praise for Oberg’s presentation on Monday night.

“I think it is much improvement over previous discussions we had years ago,” he said.

But he still pushed the board to consider spending down its reserves. District policy is to have an amount equal to 30 percent of its operating budget in reserves, even though McQuillan said the state only requires the district to have 27 percent.

“Take some of that $48 million and put that toward the debt,” he said.