2014 Finance Department Annual Report

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8 II. Core Functions 2014 Annual Report · Public Works Department · St. Anthony Village, Minnesota 2015 TAX LEVY ESTABLISHED IN 2014 In preparing the 2015 budget, Staff continued its mission to maintain the existing level of City services and programs with the use of fi nancially conservative budgeting. Overall, the 2015 levy increased by $218,900 over last year’s levy amount. This represents a 3.9% increase over the 2014 levy. The increase was substantially due to costs drivers within the General Fund. These drivers included but were not limited to: · Salaries – 2.25% COLA’s base union settlements · Health Insurance premiums up – 10. 5% with City’s 50% cost share agreed to in union settlements · State increases in pension funding requirements: · 3.5% for non-police and fi re · 5.9% for police and fi re (6.2% in 2014) · Workers Compensation Costs up 13% · Property, casualty and liability insurance costs up 12.25% · Utility Costs up 5.1% refl ecting proposed and anticipated rate increases applied to current consumption levels The City again employed two elements of property tax relief for 2015. The fi rst element was the City’s allocation of Local Government Aid (LGA). The City’s scheduled receipt of $505,415 in LGA in 2015 represents an increase of $62,448 over 2014 LGA. The increase in LGA yields a 1.21% impact on the overall levy requirement as demonstrated in the graph below. With the Council’s direction, the cumulative 2015 LGA was allocated in the following manner · 33% reduced reliance on Liquor profi ts and reduced cost allocations to utility funds · 37% Property Tax Relief, negating the impact certain annual cost factors · 22% Addressing severance obligations, and risk management · 8% Property Tax Relief, supplanting decreases in revenues and other aids The second element was the continuation of the City’s is the “Peak to Plateau” initiative started in 2014 to mitigate the levy impact of the annual street reconstruction program expected to continue into the next decade. The scheduled debt levy reduction for 2015 of $147,500 provided 2.33% impact on the overall levy requirement as demonstrated in the graph below. These two elements of Property Tax relief reduced the Overall Levy increase required for 2015 and reduced the overall from 7.64% to 3.90%. Lastly with the decertifi cation of the Cub TIF District the increase in the City tax rate is estimated to be less than 1% (0.42%). 7.64% 5.01%3.90%Debt levy reduction Additional LGA Estimated change in City Tax rate with TIF decertifi cation 0.42% Impact of Levy Release