The Mayor's Corner
The Mayor's Corner
Mayor’s Quarterly Art Contest:
Congratulations to Nancy Mitchell, whose photograph of Owls Head Lighthouse in Owls Head, Maine was selected as the first winner of the Mayor’s Quarterly Art Contest! Her photograph will be on display in the Somersworth Mayor’s Office from now until June 30th, 2024. Please stop by, say hello, and check out this beautiful photograph.
Congratulations are also in order for Kyla Yoder whose hand-thrown pottery bowl was selected to be displayed in the Mayor’s Office for the months of July, August, and September, as well as for Bertha Robbins whose modern art quilt will be displayed for the months of October, November, and December.
Congratulations to all the winners, and thank you to all the residents who submitted their artwork to the contest. Keep your ears and eyes open later this year when we open up submissions for 2025.
City Budget and City-Wide Revaluation:
Deliberations for the 2024-2025 Budget officially begin for the City Council on April 1st (not an April Fools Day joke!) with Budget presentations by the City Manager and Superintendent at 6:00 PM and a Public Hearing on the Budget at 7:00 PM. A variety of factors make this Budget particularly challenging. One important factor that is worth reminding the Community about is the fact that the City is currently undergoing a City-wide property revaluation. The revaluation we are undertaking is a State requirement; the State constitution and statutes require all municipalities to revalue all taxable property every five years. This revaluation allows the City and the State to have an up-to-date sense of the value of all taxable property that can be used to pay for Budgets and services. After this year’s revaluation, the City of Somersworth will be able to use the new values when creating future Budgets.
During a typical year the City is able to include new developments or any newly taxable projects, such as new buildings, homes, businesses, or land that have been put onto the City's tax roll over the past year. These new projects help to increase the total pool of money that our Budget pulls from via taxes, and help to increase the tax cap allowance. For example, during last year’s Budget process these new construction projects accounted for an additional $25 million in taxable property, adding over $700,000 in taxes to the City. Some years have added even more! As you can tell, this is an essential piece of the Budget calculation.
This year is trickier. Our City’s Charter (Section 7.4.1.B) prevents us from considering any of these newly taxable projects and developments when Budgeting during a revaluation year. That means we miss out on a large piece of taxable property this year when creating our Budget, and ultimately, this revaluation year makes our Budget that much tighter.
I cannot say with certainty how the Budget will shake out over the course of this month. There are many important services, departments, and programs that are vying for the same pool of money. The Somersworth School Board, for example, has presented a Budget within the tax cap, but also included an additional set of recommendations above the tax cap which would allow them to maintain necessary services. The City Manager is presenting a Budget which delays purchasing important equipment, lowers the amount the City spends on roads, and delays some hiring. Without a tax cap override a number of things would go unfunded and the progress made by this City may stagnate. But questions about this override - how much, if at all - must be answered by the City Council. Though I dare not predict the outcome for this Budget, what I do know is that the City Council will make the best possible decision with the information available, within the limitations placed on them by this difficult Budget year. I also know that the voices and input of residents go a long way in helping make these difficult Budget decisions a little bit easier. Please don’t hesitate to reach out to me or any of the nine City Councilors with questions, concerns, or wishes for what you’d like to see included in the budget.
Some good news, however, is that once the revaluation is complete, Somersworth typically sees a decrease in our tax rate. Over the past five years property values have increased dramatically in the City - for better or for worse - meaning that the City will have an even larger pool of taxable property to use to pay for services. When the State of New Hampshire officially sets our tax rate this November, this larger pool of taxable property is used to pay for the same Budget, and thus the tax burden is spread out more evenly, and often means that the City can tax at a lower rate in order to collect the same amount of money. For example, during the last property revaluation the tax rate fell from $33.41 to $27.28 - a decrease of more than $6! So even if passage of the 2024-2025 Budget this spring results in a tax cap override, remember that there is the potential for a sizable decrease in the rate come November. Though I find this process and timeline unfavorable for how inconvenient and unclear it makes our decision-making during the Budget season - no one likes deciding on a Budget when you won’t know the tax rate with certainty for seven more months - I can say with certainty that the best interests of this Community will always be placed front and center.