Property tax rates should remain flat next year, Charles County government proposes, which would result in an average tax decrease in most areas, but an average increase in La Plata and Port Tobacco, where assessments also have risen.
Tax bills for individual property owners depend on the assessed value of their properties, but falling assessments in most of the county mean taxes will fall by an average of 3.8 percent, according to county documents, if the tax rate is maintained at $1.026 per $100 of assessed value.
The total tax rate is the same within the independent municipalities of Indian Head, La Plata and Port Tobacco, as in the rest of the county, but the revenues are split between county and town governments.
In Indian Head, keeping the county tax rate of 99.8 cents will mean average tax payments will plunge by 21.3 percent because of collapsing property values.
But in La Plata and Port Tobacco, also municipalities, keeping the tax rate of 94.1 cents means that, on average, taxes there will increase by 2.9 percent, documents state.
Property tax rates need to stay low to help elderly people, said Lee Weinberger of Bryantown, at a public hearing Wednesday night in La Plata.
“This has been, as [commissioners’ President] Candice Kelly knows, one of my hot buttons for years. I think it is important that everyone live within their means, including the county. Your means is not my back pocket, although that’s what the tax rate is,” Weinberger said.
As a disabled veteran, he doesn’t pay property taxes, Weinberger said, but was concerned about their impact on other people. He also offered to examine the budget himself to find ways to cut spending.
If commissioners were to raise the property tax, however, this could be a step toward balancing the budget, which currently has a $7 million deficit, County Administrator Rebecca Bridgett proposed Wednesday.
In expenditures, the proposed budget includes a 1 percent raise for county employees, who received no raises this year and endured furloughs in fiscal 2010. Spending the $576,700 to grant the raise is “conservative, fiscally responsible and employee-friendly,” Bridgett said.
“One percent, if that’s what we ultimately approve, is not a lot, but it’s a message,” said Commissioner Ken Robinson (D).
Overall the proposed spending is $1.8 million, or 0.6 percent, more than last year, at $307 million, while revenues have fallen 1.7 percent, to reach $300 million.
Contention was wholly absent from a public hearing on the budget, with government and education officials the only people to speak. They praised the Charles County commissioners as good stewards of county money, and the commissioners had nothing but good things to say in return.
“I am somewhat relieved I don’t see umbrellas or raincoats. This may be a good day,” President Candice Quinn Kelly (D) said as Liz Brown, president of the county teachers union, approached the microphone.
“I don’t have to do that this year,” Brown responded.
At last year’s hearing, teachers wore rain gear to urge commissioners to dip into the county’s “rainy day fund” to give them raises.
Brown, as head of the Education Association of Charles County, urged the commissioners to fight attempts by the state to pass pension costs on to local governments, saying such a move would “devastate our school system.”
“Considering what they did to our pensions in Annapolis … I don’t see why they also have to ship them to you, too,” she said.
The commissioners were right to increase the Charles County Board of Education’s budget by $324,000, or 0.2 percent, said school board Chairwoman Roberta S. Wise.
“We continue to rein in spending,” Wise said. “… The budget has seen more hits than growth in the past three years.”
“We’ve had some tough issues we’ve had to work with in the past 90 days and it’s certainly been a pleasure” working with school officials, Kelly said.
Law enforcement also was pleased with its allotment, said Maj. Buddy Gibson, assistant sheriff for administration. As a whole, the budget for public safety, which includes animal control, emergency response and other functions as well as the Charles County Sheriff’s Office, is seeing an increase of $2.6 million, or 3.5 percent.
The sheriff’s office is “committed to being a steward of public funds to a level beyond reproach,” Gibson said.
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