Village of Dolton Holds Truth and Taxation Public Hearing And Approves Tax Levy

Village of Dolton Board of Trustees recently voted unanimously to approve an increase tax leave that will raise property taxes by 3.33 percent. Photo Credit: Village of Dolton
Village of Dolton Board of Trustees recently voted unanimously to approve an increase tax leave that will raise property taxes by 3.33 percent. Photo Credit: Village of Dolton

Village of Dolton Holds Truth and Taxation Public Hearing And Approves Tax Levy

By Katherine Newman

A public hearing was recently held in the Village of Dolton to approve a proposed property tax levy. The Mayor of the Village of Dolton, Riley Rogers, along with the Board of Trustees answered questions from residents about the proposed levy and the hearing concluded with a unanimous vote to approve it.

Ordinance number 18-019 levying taxes for general and corporate purposes for the 2018 tax year for the Village of Dolton was approved by the board of trustees and will result in 3.33 percent increase in total property taxes to be levied for the 2018 tax year compared to the 2017 tax year.

During the public hearing, several residents raised questions about why the Village of Dolton has an unbalanced budget and who was responsible for previous financial decisions that were made.

“Years back, we did not have separated accounts the way that we should have and over the years as we got financial audits it was recommended that we split the funds and we followed that directive, however, going back to 2010 or 2011 all the money that came in came into one bank account, the general fund. There was water money coming in there and TIF money coming in there and that money should not have all been in that account to make sure that we could see what money was meant to go where,” said Trustee Jason House.

The newly approved tax levy will move the Village closer to a balanced budget, but one Trustee spoke out about his thoughts on the value of this levy.

“We can raise the levy and we can raise fees, but if we don’t fix it internally nothing is going to change. Even with this levy being raised we still have a deficit,” said Trustee Duane Muhammad.

Others were more confident about the value of the added tax dollars. Trustee House said that as a whole, the Village of Dolton has been adopting the financial recommendations that they have been given and are working to find the best ways to move forward regardless of the deficit.

“This will cover us so that we can take care of the City of Chicago in the way that we have negotiated our settlement but we do still have financial challenges and have to look at ways of covering the budget and also making sure that as we are raising taxes the services that we are getting for our taxes are getting better and I think that has been the biggest challenge. We are paying the taxes but we are not always seeing the services and that is what we are going to work on,” said Trustee House.

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