City hosts last tax rate, budget hearing
The city of Graham hosted their second and final public hearing for the proposed budget and tax rate Tuesday evening, with some public attendance and concerns.
The proposed budget for the general fund revenue is $50,052 in the red, but the city council spoke about a potential raise in taxes to balance the budget accordingly during their budget workshop Thursday, Aug. 15. The city distributed a handout at the meeting Tuesday, with the figure regarding a potential 2.5% increase over the effective rate to a tax rate of 0.6672166 per $100 valuation which would raise an additional $52,551.82 and balance the budget.
For a home valued at $75,000, the 2.5% tax rate raise would increase from $489.53 under the current tax rate to $500.41 (a difference of $10.89). For a home valued at $150,000, the tax rate would increase from $979.05 under the current tax rate to $1,000.82 (a difference of $21.77). For a home valued at $225,000, the tax rate would increase from $1,468.58 under the current tax rate to $1,501.24 (a difference of $32.66).
“There is not a lot of fluff in this budget and we trimmed things to the bone,” councilman Kyle Peavy said. “There were some capital requests from the departments that we turned down to keep this thing as close to the bone as we can keep it. Now we have still got the debt on the new water plant that we are trying to service. That’s a burden for us all, but we are not going to get new jobs and new people moving into a community that doesn’t have a good water program. I know we have some issues with the pipes and we are trying to address that, but there again, it takes money to address it and so we are trying to do it a little at a time as we can so as not to overburden the citizens.”
Graham Director of Public Works, Randall Dawson, gave a report to the city council during their last meeting on Thursday, Sept. 5, and said the department was beginning work on specific water line replacement.
“Next week (last week) we are going to try to abandon an old four-inch line on Pecan St., we are going to start making some taps on the 10-inch line that runs down the other side of the road and then just go from there and start moving East,” he said during the Sept. 5 meeting.
Graham Mayor Neal Blanton said the issues with the water plant and lines is a concern which should have been taken care of by previous members of the city council, but the current members are dedicated to make what changes they can.
“We should have addressed the water plant years ago and we should have addressed the distribution system on it years ago and we didn’t for whatever reason and none of the people that are on the council now were back then, so we don’t know what the situation was,” Blanton said. “We are determined to address those things and make things better with the roads and the water distribution system and everything else that we have.”
Blanton said he hopes some of the increased revenue will go toward repairing the streets and water lines, but the councilmen have worked to make sure the burden is not solely on the taxpayers.
“There is a burden on the taxpayer and we don’t want to add an unfair amount to that tax burden that they have,” Blanton said. “So that is why we have been so conservative with what we are looking at and what we are proposing this year.”
One concern brought up by Susie Cerecedez during the public hearing Tuesday was the amount of jobs offered in Graham and how the jobs offered are minimum wage positions.
“We are at a record low in unemployment right now,” City Manager Brandon Anderson said. “What do we do for jobs and that’s an economic development choice. We deal with that on a daily occurrence. The GEIC, the GIA met yesterday. They continue to try to improve and bring jobs to Graham, but we have to have people who want to take those jobs. Also, we have to have affordable housing for those people as well.”
Blanton said Graham Economic Development is working daily to bring more jobs to Graham and make an impact within the community. He said Graham has been working to move away from their past when they lost two major companies.
“I was in the middle of when Hexcel (Corporation) left in the mid-90s, the early 90s, and when Graham Magnetics, and that is a sobering fact when you lose 300 jobs or 400 jobs and our community fought back and came back,” Blanton said. “It’s not where we want in terms of job creation and more jobs that we think are important and are needed, professional jobs. Our economic development group is working on it every day and we are working on it and the whole group of people in the community are trying to make an impact and seeing how we can raise our profile and get more jobs.”
Another request by Cerecedez was the streaming of city council meetings, which happen at 9 a.m. on Thursdays, so they can be viewed at any time by those who are unable to attend the meetings. Anderson and Blanton said they could look into the cost, but they would make sure to have microphones and proper setup.
“I think that is something that we need to look at and see if we have the capabilities of doing that and streaming on our website or something like that, but I think that is a legitimate request,” Blanton said.
The adoption of the budget and tax rate is set for Thursday, Sept. 19, during the next regularly scheduled city council meeting. The final date of Friday, Sept. 27, on the budget calendar is for the city to publish a summary of budget, make an announcement of where it can be reviewed, file with the city secretary and county clerk and post it to the city website.
For the rest of the story, see the Saturday, Sept. 14 edition of The Graham Leader.
