County passes budget, no tax hike
By Steve Herring
Published in News on July 7, 2017 5:50 AM
There is no change in the tax rate in the approximately $194 million budget approved by Wayne County commissioners meeting in special session Thursday morning.
It took the board just minutes to adopt the new budget that maintains the current tax rate at 66.35 cents per $100 of property value.
There are no fee increases.
Commissioner Joe Daughtery questioned one change to the budget concerning an increase in the hotel occupancy tax.
"In looking at budget projections, we projected a little more revenue," Assistant County Manager Craig Honeycutt said.
Also approved was a five-year, $65.1 million capital improvement plan.
The bulk of the money, $48.4 million, is included in the 2017-18 fiscal year.
Of that total, the new Maxwell Regional Agricultural and Convention Center ($12 million) and the new Meadow Lane Elementary School and its Edgewood Community Development School wing ($20 million) account for more than $32 million.
Another $3.2 million is for a new gym and classrooms at Southern Wayne High School and $2.6 million for a new sewer line at Grantham Elementary and Middle schools.
Commissioners had been prepared to adopt the budget at their June 20 meeting, but chose instead to put in place a roughly $10.1 million interim spending plan pending approval of the state budget.
The county had operated under the interim budget since July 1.
The new budget now takes the place of that interim budget.
Commissioners had been counting on the state budget to include a one-time $2 million funding supplement for Wayne County Public Schools.
The supplement was needed to replace $2 million in low-wealth education funding the county lost because its tax rate does not meet the threshold for funding under that program.
The $2 million was included in the state budget.
Commissioners had indicated a willingness to increase taxes by 2.46 cents per $100 worth of property value if the state failed to budget the $2 million
The tax increase would have generated just enough revenue to offset the lost.
However, once set a tax rate cannot be changed until the following budget year.
It was for that reason that commissioners held off on adopting the regular budget -- they did not want to set a tax rate until after they knew the fate of the $2 million.