By MORRIS B. PONGRATZ
Los Alamos

Folks,

The actions you take in approving the level of property tax revenues in April/May end up setting the property tax rates that you will be asked to approve later in the summer. At that time citizens will protest the property tax increases, but the state will give you no option but to agree with the rates they propose.

So the time to keep property taxes from increasing is during the current budget process.

Property tax revenues (page 76) are proposed to increase by 6.1%. LAC does not need the increased revenues. “Unassigned” in the “Ending Fund Balance” is over $25M. Property taxes make it harder to buy a house and harder for businesses to survive.

Solution – instruct staff to keep proposed property tax revenues at the FY2021 projected level ($7,813,867) and not the proposed level of $8,291,268. Please make a motion to do this and put folks on the record.

Thanks for your service!