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When Village of Lansing Trustees took a first look at a $1.8 million budget in their regular meeting Monday they found that Village taxes are likely to go down this year.  "The proposal is for the tax rate to be $1.40, down from $1.59," said Clerk/Treasurer Jodi Dake.  "Our assessed base has gone down, too, but with North Triphammer Road being pretty much done the rate is going down."


Dake explained that the goal is to keep the tax rate steady from year to year without big rises and drops.  But with the Triphammer reconstruction project largely completed and no other big projects on the drawing board, the Village will be able to drop the tax rate even though the taxable assessed value has gone down this year and the Village expects less sales tax revenue.

Dake said that sales tax revenue will go down because the Village has a smaller percentage of the total population of Tompkins County.  With little room for growth in the Village, other municipalities such as the Town of Lansing are growing, changing the population distribution.  "All the sales tax that comes into the Village doesn't stay in the Village," explained Attorney David Dubow.  "It's County sales tax and then there's a distribution."

For at least a year there is also less assessed value to draw from in the Village.  "Our actual taxable assessed value has gone down because of a $5 million adjustment to the Pyramid Mall property," Dake told the Trustees.  "I think it is because they took off the Ames building.  In a year it is going to go up again, because the cinema is going in."  

Trustee Lynn Leopold expressed concern that State waste water requirements are becoming overwhelming, and asked for help from the Village's engineering firm to deal with reporting and compliance.  Leopold received nine pages of notes on the Village's compliance with storm water regulations and mandates.  While the trustees felt the notes reflected deficiencies in the form of reporting over the substance of Village activities, all agreed the requirements are more than one trustee should be handling alone.

But Deputy Mayor Larry Fresinski pointed out that there is already ample money available in the budget as proposed.  He also noted that even juggling the amount put aside for future capital needs won't put undue strain on Village taxpayers.  "We have to justify the fact that our budget for 2007 is $500,000 less than 2008, and $341,000 of that is going to a savings account.  But the interesting thing about the juggling is that we're still dropping our tax rate by 14%."

Trustees will review the numbers they were shown Monday, and adjust some line items to reflect plans for next year.  But Dake was optimistic that regardless of changes the tax rate will be lower when the budget is finalized.

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