Sean C. Morgan
The City of Sweet Home is holding off hiring a police officer and holding back spending to help cover an unanticipated shortfall in funding for the library and Police Department.
Last fall, the city learned that the overall property values in Sweet Home went down last year, meaning the city faced an unexpected loss of roughly $90,000 in the police levy, $11,500 with the library levy and $18,000 in the general fund.
The library opened in October, approximately four months after the start of the new year. Finance Director Pat Gray is hoping that by watching expenses there, the months it was closed will make up for the shortfall and make it through the year.
The Police Department has chosen not to fill a position vacated recently by Malcolm Macalpine.
Had the department remained at full staff, Police Chief Bob Burford said, it would likely have had to layoff a police officer.
Already, the department had frozen some expenditures and did not purchase its annual patrol vehicle, which runs between $25,000 and $30,000.
“We’re tight on our budgets across the board,” Chief Burford said. On top of the shortfall in revenues, expenses are up, including gas prices and dispatch costs because of training.
While Sweet Home’s combined tax rate increases this year, overall assessed property value in the city decreased and the City of Sweet Home faces a shortfall in anticipated revenue.
Every year, the city anticipates receiving less revenue than it levies in taxes because of delinquent taxes and 1990’s Measure Five compression.
Overall, tax rates within the City of Sweet Home combined are $21.77 up from $20.46 per $1,000 of property value.
In addition to the previously anticipated losses in revenues, the city had the additional shortfall.
The city had anticipated, based on estimates from the assessor’s office, a total value of $267.2 million for property within the city limits, a $10 million increase in value. Instead, Sweet Home property decreased in value by about $2.6 million this year.
The new value means the general fund will receive less revenue based on the city’s permanent rate. It will also increase compression on the city’s local option levies for police and library service along with the county law levy.
Sweet Home added no new value in the last calendar year, that real market value declined by $109,000 and personal property in Sweet Home dropped by $2.4 million with 80 percent of that decline directly attributable to the sale of cable infrastructure by AT&T to Comcast.
AT&T had been ninth on the city’s list of top-10 taxpayers. This year, it is not on that list. The sale of Willamette Industries to Weyerhaeuser also included a decline in value, from $12.5 million to $9.7 million. Weyerhaeuser is the top taxpayer, $59,222 down from $75,019, within the city limits.
CenturyTel’s net assessed value also decreased from $22.2 million to $20.2 million while Northwest Natural’s value grew from $27.8 million to $29.5 million. CenturyTel pays the second most in taxes in Sweet Home, and Northwest Natural is fourth. Whittaker/Northwest Partners, assessed at $2.8 million, is second on the list.
Throughout Linn County, overall taxable value increased from $5.5 billion to $5.6 billion. Real property increased in value by $156 million while personal property decreased by $14.7 million to $193.1 million.