Somerton leaves property tax rate unchanged, postpones spending
SOMERTON – The city will keep its property tax at the same rate and postpone major expenditures until at least early 2021, under a new budget approved recently by the city council.
The budget for the fiscal year that began July 1 totals $26.5 million, nearly $3 million more than the previous fiscal year.
Projects involving large expenditures will wait until after December to allow Somerton officials to see how the pandemic affects consumer sales and, thus, how much sales tax revenue the city takes in during the first half of fiscal 2020-21.
Projects to be delayed include the startup of a program to improve storefronts along Main Street, renovation of the basketball court at Joe Muñoz Park and installation of an air conditioning system at the Somerton Community Center.
Also on hold pending sale tax collections will be the purchase of a street sweeper and a new garbage truck, development of a skateboarding area on the south side of the city, and $2 million in continuing street improvements.
“Those projects were put in the budget, but they are conditioned on revenues coming in,” Mayor Gerardo Anaya said. “In December we are going to review the numbers and see which can be done and which can’t.”
The projects also are conditioned on the city receiving $1.9 million in AZCares funds distributed by the state to help Arizona cities and counties recover from the economic fallout of the pandemic. Somerton officials said they have been told to expect that amount from the state, although Anaya said the city has yet to receive it.
“Really we don’t know if the state is going to give it us, so we put it in the budget as contingency.”
Earmarked in the budget as unavoidable expenditures in the
new fiscal year are pay increases for patrol officers and dispatchers in the police department to prevent turnover, the hiring of a full-time city attorney, hiring of a security guard for municipal court, and hiring of a private firm to recruit a new grocery store to the city.
Also budget as essential expenditures are installation of water and sewer lines on the city’s west side to serve a future high school and commercial development.
Anaya said the city initially looked at raising the property tax rate, but decided against it.
“This year has been difficult for everyone and we didn’t want to affect families any more with an increase,” he said. “Although we need more revenue, we say that it was not the right thing to do.”