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Hernando Today

Belt Tightening On Horizon For Brooksville

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By LINNEA BROWN

Hernando Today

Published: July 22, 2008

BROOKSVILLE - It's best to have a cushion, just in case.

That's the word from the members of Brooksville's City Council, who voted 5-0 Monday during their regular meeting to take a conservative approach to this year's budget process by starting with a tentative millage rate of 7 mills, just as they did last year.

The millage rate is $1 for every $1,000 of assessed value. At that rate, a property owner with a home worth $150,000 with a $50,000 homestead exemption would see a tax bill of about $700.

But the tentative rate, mailed to residents in August, is typically set a little higher than the council expects the final rate to be, due to state guidelines designed to prevent entities from raising their millage rates after notices have been mailed out.

"We can always go down. We just can't go any higher," council member Joe Bernardini said.

Though last year's tentative millage rate started off at 7, it was dropped to 6.32 mills during the budgeting process. At that rate, the same home owner would see a tax bill of $632.

Last's year's rate brought in about $3.4 million in ad valorem revenue.

To bring in the same amount of money and still keep ad valorem taxes the same, the council would have to set this year's rate at 6.58 mills, or the so-called rollback rate.

"You won't have a tax increase if you adopt the (rollback rate)," finance director Steve Baumgartner explained.

He recommended that council members either start with the rollback rate or last year's rate of 7 mills, which Bernardini initially spoke for.

"I don't have a problem with it," he said. "It's just a tentative millage."

Because the millage rate is staying the same, Brooksville won't face a huge drop in ad valorem revenue despite plummeting property values.

But city government will certainly have to do what many of its residents are already doing: prioritize and stretch every dollar even farther to meet basic needs.

Baumgartner said he expects the city's general fund to be in the same neighborhood as last year - about $8.7 million.

Mayor David Pugh said he had hoped the council could manage at least a modest tax cut, but said that would have been a difficult task considering it at this point in the process.

"Technically, under all the rules and regulations, it's not an increase, but I'm going to feel it," he said.

"It's still going to come out of my pocketbook. It's best to keep it lower."

Pressing capital projects for next year include street repairs and the need to replace the city's hobbled air-conditioning unit, with preliminary estimates as high as $200,000.

But because property assessments lag a year behind, officials have said the next budget may be more difficult.

Reporter Linnea Brown can be reached at 352-544-5289 or lbrown@hernandotoday.com.

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