Commissioners OK CCD Tax Increase
July 28, 2016 at 4:25 p.m.
By Jordan Fouts-
The new rate, $0.0333 per $100 of assessed value, is expected to generate an extra $996,000, money that could be used for general purposes as well as highways, commissioners said during a public hearing ahead of the vote. Aside from a question over the CCD versus the wheel tax and surtax – which the county council will vote on again Thursday – there were no public comments.
The surtax on automobile registration or renewal proposed at about $25 and the prospective $40 wheel tax on other vehicles subject to excise taxes must be approved by a majority of council members in order to pass. The surtax would apply for instance to personal vehicles and the wheel tax to larger machines like dump trucks.
Commissioner Ron Truex remarked this morning that county officials’ intention is to get any money they can in order to get roads back into good shape.
Kevin Woodward, a Wells County commissioner who attended the meeting, urged Kosciusko officials to get their funds as high as they could and presented his own county as a cautionary tale. He said Wells set its wheel tax at the minimum in order “to look after the taxpayers and be good stewards,” but soon found that costs “get ahead of you, it swallows you up, and the state doesn’t recognize you.”
The current CCD rate is $0.0135 per $100. Umbaugh and Associates recommended the higher rate as well as the wheel tax and surtax among measures to offset a projected $4.4 million budget shortfall by 2016. The new CCD rate will apply to real and personal property taxes payable next year.
Also this morning, commissioners recognized World War II Navy veteran Gene E. Shoemaker, who was stationed in Guam after enlisting in 1944 right out of high school. County Veterans Affairs Officer Rich Maron relayed some of Shoemaker’s memories of his time as a radioman third class, such as a “holdout” Japanese soldier who loved to watch the troops’ baseball games and a Japanese prisoner of war who gave him a chalk drawing of his homeland on a handkerchief.
After the war Shoemaker moved to the Kosciusko area, where he worked in the Brennan Drug Store in Warsaw and later ran his own pharmacy in Ligonier. He also became a certified pilot and recently restored a 1947 Ford Super Deluxe.
Also this morning, commissioners:
• Opened eight bids for two dump trucks for the county highway department, many in the $300,000 range for the pair. Highway Superintendent Scott Tilden will make a recommendation in about two weeks.
• Approved a bid letting date of July 15 at 9:15 a.m. for the rehab of county bridge 278, on Front Street in Syracuse, at Tilden’s request.
• Approved a rezoning request from petitioner George Buckingham for 2.2 acres near Stanton Lake. The request for rezoning from agriculture to residential was unanimously recommended by the Area Plan Commission.[[In-content Ad]]
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The new rate, $0.0333 per $100 of assessed value, is expected to generate an extra $996,000, money that could be used for general purposes as well as highways, commissioners said during a public hearing ahead of the vote. Aside from a question over the CCD versus the wheel tax and surtax – which the county council will vote on again Thursday – there were no public comments.
The surtax on automobile registration or renewal proposed at about $25 and the prospective $40 wheel tax on other vehicles subject to excise taxes must be approved by a majority of council members in order to pass. The surtax would apply for instance to personal vehicles and the wheel tax to larger machines like dump trucks.
Commissioner Ron Truex remarked this morning that county officials’ intention is to get any money they can in order to get roads back into good shape.
Kevin Woodward, a Wells County commissioner who attended the meeting, urged Kosciusko officials to get their funds as high as they could and presented his own county as a cautionary tale. He said Wells set its wheel tax at the minimum in order “to look after the taxpayers and be good stewards,” but soon found that costs “get ahead of you, it swallows you up, and the state doesn’t recognize you.”
The current CCD rate is $0.0135 per $100. Umbaugh and Associates recommended the higher rate as well as the wheel tax and surtax among measures to offset a projected $4.4 million budget shortfall by 2016. The new CCD rate will apply to real and personal property taxes payable next year.
Also this morning, commissioners recognized World War II Navy veteran Gene E. Shoemaker, who was stationed in Guam after enlisting in 1944 right out of high school. County Veterans Affairs Officer Rich Maron relayed some of Shoemaker’s memories of his time as a radioman third class, such as a “holdout” Japanese soldier who loved to watch the troops’ baseball games and a Japanese prisoner of war who gave him a chalk drawing of his homeland on a handkerchief.
After the war Shoemaker moved to the Kosciusko area, where he worked in the Brennan Drug Store in Warsaw and later ran his own pharmacy in Ligonier. He also became a certified pilot and recently restored a 1947 Ford Super Deluxe.
Also this morning, commissioners:
• Opened eight bids for two dump trucks for the county highway department, many in the $300,000 range for the pair. Highway Superintendent Scott Tilden will make a recommendation in about two weeks.
• Approved a bid letting date of July 15 at 9:15 a.m. for the rehab of county bridge 278, on Front Street in Syracuse, at Tilden’s request.
• Approved a rezoning request from petitioner George Buckingham for 2.2 acres near Stanton Lake. The request for rezoning from agriculture to residential was unanimously recommended by the Area Plan Commission.[[In-content Ad]]
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