Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, April 11, 1990 TAG: 9004110534
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: EVENING
SOURCE: MARK LAYMAN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Tax bills for the current year, which will be mailed later this month, will be based on the current rate of $1.15 per $100 of assessed value. But the supervisors told County Administrator Elmer Hodge to base the 1990-1991 budget on a rate of $1.13.
The new rate will save the owner of an $80,000 house $16 a year in taxes. It will cost the county $542,000 in revenue over 12 months.
However, the lower rate won't take effect until midway through the 1990-1991 fiscal year, which begins July 1. So the county will lose only $271,000 in revenue in next year's budget.
Hodge said he could offset the lower rate by reducing the $350,000 budgeted for the purchase of land, engineering and construction at the new regional landfill. Other localities that use the landfill are to reimburse the county for part of that cost.
Hodge's insistence that further budget cuts wouldn't be necessary didn't satisfy Supervisor Steve McGraw, who cast the only vote against the lower tax rate.
Minutes earlier, the supervisors had rejected Supervisor Lee Eddy's motion to base the 1990-1991 budget on a rate of $1.13. They also rejected a motion by Supervisor Harry Nickens to keep the rate at $1.15, with 2 cents set aside for capital improvements. Nickens then revived Eddy's motion, and it was approved.
The vote followed a public hearing that pitted teachers who wanted more money for schools against advocates of a tax cut.
The possibility of a reduction in the tax rate was "startling," said Shelby Thomason of the Roanoke County Education Association.
But David Courey urged the supervisors to lower the rate to offset increases in the assessed value of many homes. "The good standard [of living in the county] cannot continue if our tax bill keeps going up every year," he said.
And Ann Motley said she had collected nearly 500 signatures on a petition protesting this year's assessments. "I would have had more if my feet had held out," she said.
In a letter accompanying his proposed 1990-1991 budget, which he gave the supervisors on Tuesday, Hodge recommended that construction bids for the Spring Hollow Reservoir be put on hold until after the Roanoke-Roanoke County consolidation vote in November.
The supervisors didn't like that idea, though. They asked Hodge to brief them on alternatives for paying for the reservoir at their April 24 meeting and to put the project out for bids the following day.
The supervisors also questioned Hodge's proposal to include money in the budget for five new patrol officers for the new county police department. Eddy and Nickens said it might be better to wait and see whether the new police chief thinks the additional officers are needed.
And the supervisors disagreed on whether to implement the results of a study that compared salaries of county employees with salaries in the private sector. As a result of that survey, Hodge recommended spending $391,000 to raise the pay of 213 employees in many job classifications.
Hodge will give the supervisors more details on the salary study on April 24, when a public hearing on the budget also is scheduled. The supervisors are scheduled to approve the budget on May 8. B4 B1 TAX Tax
by CNB