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Officials in St. Cloud are considering whether to raise the city’s tax rate next year to fill what its mayor says are funding gaps for maintenance and reserves.
Jake Anderson, who took office in January, presented his first proposed budget to the city council last month. He called for a shift in budgeting philosophy from his predecessor, longtime St. Cloud Mayor Dave Kleis.
During Kleis’ nearly 20-year tenure, the city operated under a strategy of relying on economic growth to grow revenue and avoid tax increases, Anderson said. But the city hasn't kept up with repairing buildings and replacing equipment and technology, he said.
"If we don't begin to act now, this gap will become, in my opinion, completely unsustainable and even more difficult to fix,” he said.
Almost two-thirds of the city’s vehicles and equipment are due to be replaced, Anderson said. About 3 percent are more than two decades overdue.
Inflation is driving up replacement costs, Anderson said, “so we need to begin chipping away at it.”
But he doesn’t want to use budget reserves to pay for the upgrades. Over the last decade and a half, the city has reduced money set aside for emergencies, Anderson said.
“That's just solving it now, pushing it off later, and I don't think we should do that,” he said.
Anderson is asking to increase the city's property tax rate by about 4.5 percent next year to help close the funding gaps. As a result, the owner of a $200,000 home would see a property tax increase of about $72 a year.
His proposed budget includes almost $101 million in spending, a 12 percent increase from this year.
A public hearing is scheduled for Monday night at St. Cloud City Hall. The city council will approve the final budget and levy in December.
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