At their regular meeting on June 20, members of the Logan Municipal Council voted to approve a budget in excess of $200 million for the city in FY 2023-2024.
LOGAN – During their regular meeting on June 20, the members of the Logan Municipal Council approved a balanced budget for the Fiscal Year 2023-2024 of more than $200 million for the city.
With only three members present, the vote by council member Amy Z. Anderson, Tom Jensen and Jeannie F. Simmonds to approve next year’s budget had to be unanimous and it was.
That budget included a certified property tax rate of 0.000990 for calendar year 2023 and fiscal year 2023-2024, which officials took great pains to state was not a tax increase.
Earlier in the meeting, city finance director Richard Anderson had dutifully recited the legal jargon required by the Utah Truth in Taxation (TNT) Law and the council members approved Resolution 23-25, setting that certified tax rate.
Prior to enactment of the TNT Law in 1985, local city and county governments received an automatic tax revenue increase whenever property valuations increased.
But the Utah Taxpayers Association successfully argued that local governments should not receive, for example, an automatic 12 percent revenue increase simply because property valuations increased 12 percent.
Under TNT, property tax rates are required to be recalculated every year based on revenue. As property valuations increase, the tax rate is reduced accordingly so that the local taxing entity does not receive an automatic revenue increase.
Anderson indicated that the 0.000990 tax rate is sufficient to allow to city to collect about $5 million in property tax, the same amount that was collected in Fiscal Year 2022-2023.
Other revenues projections in the city budget include more than $25 million in sales taxes; more than $114 million in service fee charges; and more than $20 million in transfers from other accounts.
Projected expenditures include more than $54 million in personnel costs; more than $78 million for operations and maintenance; and more than $22 million for capital outlays.
The bottom line of those and other items in both those budget categories is the same — $201,830,702.
Logan Mayor Holly Daines had presented a slightly smaller budget to the city council on May 2. After fine tuning during workshop sessions held in May and early June, the final budget was passed with minimal public comment and discussion on June 20.
Later that evening, the three council members reconvened in their role as the Logan Redevelopment Agency to also approve Resolution 23-27 RDA, setting the agency’s budget at $2,183,075 for Fiscal Year 2023-2024.
Acting council chair Amy Z. Anderson had earlier explained that both council member Mark A. Anderson and council chair Ernesto López were excused from attending the meeting on June 20.