The Sauk Prairie School Board bucked an almost decade-long trend of reducing the tax levy for property owners in the district this year and approved one of the first substantial increases in the estimated mill rate for its 2009-10 budget.
The mill rate won’t be finalized until property assessments are collated and certified in October, but Sauk Prairie School District Business Administrator Judy Weinstock estimated that the budget passed by the board would result in a tax levy of $8.48 cents per $1,000 in assessed valuation for people who own property within the school district.
The rate had declined almost each year from $14.67 in 1995-96 to a low of $7.55 in 2006-07 and then began climbing again. A preliminary budget last year anticipated a minimal increase in the mill rate, but when property information was released from municipalities in the distric toward the end of the year, the rate actually declined slightly.
Many factors can determine changes in the mill rate, including differences from year to year in property values and population, but Sauk Prairie School District Superintendent Craig Bender said most of this year’s change occurred in Madison.
He said much of the rise in the mill rate this year was due to a decision made by the Wisconsin State Legislature to reduce state aid for schools.
In fact, the district planned for a decrease of almost $400,000 in state aid. While administrators were not sure exactly what was included for schools in the budget Gov. Doyle signed earlier in the day, Bender said most of the preliminary information he received indicated the district would get a per-pupil increase of $200, $25 more than the district planned for.
That money was added back into the budget to give administrators some breathing room to pay substitute teachers throughout the year.
With a decline of almost $400,000 in state aid, some of the loss was recouped through federal stimulus money and some through a 7.4 percent increase in local taxes.
"We’ve not had to lay any people off," Bender said during a meeting with local municipal leaders held prior to the school board meeing at the River Arts Center Gallery on June 29. "We’ve had some attrition, but we’ve been able to hold the line."
Bender warned the leaders that if the economy doesn’t improve in two years when money from the federal stimulus is exhausted, things would get much tougher for the district.
The final budget to be presented during the district’s annual meeting Aug. 10 will be $27,846,425 and was approved unanimously by the board.
