While voters in the city of Mill Creek may think the issue of making the local library a full-fledged member of the Sno-Isle Library District is a new thing, the opposite is actually the case.
Joining Sno-Isle became an option for the city in 1999, when voter approval of Initiative 695 stripped the city of revenues from the state motor vehicle excise tax. City manager Bob Stowe saw annexation as a way to ease the city’s financial burden.
Since then, other voter-approved state-wide ballot measures have further limited the amount of funding the city receives through taxes, as well as limiting how much the city can increase taxes.
“I’ve proposed for several years that the city should vote upon library annexation based on our projected revenues,” Stowe said.
Finally, earlier this year, the City Council went ahead and OK’d the idea of placing the library annexation on the ballot as the quickest way to ease the ongoing problem of declining income and increasing expenses. The vote as to whether or not to join Sno-Isle will take place Sept. 14. It is the first time the Mill Creek electorate has voted on the issue.
If voters approve the move, they will OK taxing themselves to help fund library services at a rate of 50 cents per $1,000 of assessed value, which means the owner of a home valued at $300,000 would pay $150 per year of library services. If approved, the new tax takes effect in January 2006.
“It preserves the long-term stability of library service in the community,” Mary Kelly, Sno-Isle’s community relations manager, said about annexing to the district. “The ebbs and flows of a city’s financial picture doesn’t affect the continuity of library service.”
Currently, the city funds library services out of its general fund, which is financed by property taxes. For 2004, the city’s cost is $530,000. In addition, the figure increases by one percent each year to be consistent with increases in the Sno-Isle tax levy.
“Even if (the ballot measure) passes, we could still have a shortfall of $175,000 to $420,000, depending on other economic conditions,” said Joanne Gregory, finance director for the city of Mill Creek.
Gregory, however, acknowledged that her estimates are “conservative.” She said there are signs the economy and sales tax receipts are increasing, and added that sales tax projections for Mill Creek Town Center were done before most of the retailers in the new development were known.
Had the Council not approved putting the measure on the ballot, a number of city services would have been reduced or cut during deliberations on the next two-year city budget, which are under way. Among the items likely to get scaled back were concerts in the park, some recreation classes, park maintenance, building repair and maintenance, higher fees for use of the Mill Creek Sports Park, and crime prevention and teen programs.
The other option, Gregory said, was to look at implementing a utility tax or asking voters to approve a higher property tax rate than allowed under state law. Neither option has been favored by the City Council, which has final say on tax increases.
“There was no one thing that was going to make enough of an impact on the budget crisis,” Gregory said. “We were going to look at our various quality of life programs and then start trimming.”
City officials have said that having residents pay directly for the library will ease the financial situation the city faces. By not having to fund library operations out of the general fund, the city can instead devote money to maintaining the services it already provides residents.
“With other demands on a city’s budget, it’s a way to ease the stress,” Kelly said. “Cities can’t do that with the fire department or the police department.”
A recent survey of city residents taken at two budget town hall meetings showed residents want to maintain city services as they are, a position that has been echoed by the City Council and one reason it favored the idea of putting the library’s fate in the hands of voters.
“We needed to take a significant step (to ease the budget burden),” Gregory said. “We’ve trimmed and trimmed a lot already.”
Coming next week — The potential consequences of the vote.
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