{"id":2407,"date":"2019-09-14T10:54:47","date_gmt":"2019-09-14T14:54:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=2407"},"modified":"2019-09-14T10:55:02","modified_gmt":"2019-09-14T14:55:02","slug":"lakeland-commissioners-keep-2020-tax-rate-flat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2019\/09\/14\/lakeland-commissioners-keep-2020-tax-rate-flat\/","title":{"rendered":"Lakeland commissioners keep 2020 tax rate flat"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Lakeland commissioners unanimously approved a $626.8 million\nbudget Thursday night for the 2019-20 fiscal year. The budget includes a robust\nslate of economic development incentives while placing money in a fund to\naddress one of the city\u2019s looming financial issues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Property taxes will remain at the current rate of $5.46 per\n$1,000 of assessed property value. That\u2019s 3.66% above the rollback rate, which\nis the rate that would bring in the same amount of revenue as the previous\nyear. The city will charge about $273 in taxes for a home with an assessed\nproperty value of $100,000 after applying homestead exemptions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The commission\u2019s decision was made easier after City Manager\nTony Delgado announced that Lakeland\nElectric now expects a surplus <\/a>at the end of this fiscal year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe found out that Lakeland Electric is having a good year,\u201d\nhe said. \u201cThe dividend to the city is going to be more than anticipated.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The city\u2019s 2020 budget provides money for several new\neconomic and community development incentives, including $2 million set aside\nfor development of the catalyst\nsites<\/a>, a conceptual plan to redevelop Downtown Lakeland with a soccer\nstadium, retail and office spaces, and mixed-use housing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By the Numbers<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lakeland commissioners have set aside millions of dollars\nfor specific incentives in the city\u2019s 2020 fiscal budget. Here\u2019s a breakdown by\nthe dollar:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2012 $2 million for future catalyst site.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2012 $500,000 fund for targeted economic investment\nopportunities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2012 $300,000 to design and build a Cultural Enrichment Center.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2012 $250,000 for affordable housing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2012 $101,000 to sponsor homeless caseworker and assistance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2012 $65,000 to Downtown Lakeland improvement projects.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2012 $15,000 to draft preliminary documents for the police\ndepartment parking garage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Commissioners set $500,000 for targeted economic investment\nopportunities and will have to determine the criteria for projects to receive\nthe money. Another $250,000 was set aside to encourage more affordable housing\nto be built within city limits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mayor Bill Mutz\u2019s request for $101,000 to pay for a\ncity-sponsored homeless caseworker and funds to aid in getting people off the\nstreet made the cut. So did $300,000 for the design and construction of a\nCultural Enrichment Center at the main branch of the Lakeland library.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But Commissioner Justin Troller had asked Delgado to\nre-examine the proposed budget after the Sept. 5 public hearing to see whether\nmore funds could be freed up. Troller said he\u2019s concerned for the city\u2019s financial\nfuture given the extensive number of projects paid for by Lakeland Regional\nHealth Medical Center\u2019s lease payment to the city.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When commissioners agreed to cap Lakeland\nRegional\u2019s $14.38 million lease payment in August, the city lost approximately\n$6 million over the next 5 years. It also resulted in the long-term loss of\n$48.6 million in potential revenue through 2040. The majority of this money\nwould have gone into the city\u2019s Public Improvement Fund to pay for the city\u2019s\nparks, playground equipment, pools, police and fire equipment and more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Delgado said several projects were pushed back by years\nbecause of funding that was lost in the city\u2019s compromise with the hospital.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the city\u2019s property tax rate will remain flat,\nresidents will face a 4.5% increase in the city\u2019s water rate and 2.5% increase\nto the wastewater rate. These changes will cost $2.52 more per month for the\naverage residential household that uses 8,000 gallons.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lakeland commissioners unanimously approved a $626.8 million budget Thursday night for the 2019-20 fiscal year. The budget includes a robust slate of economic development incentives while placing money in a… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":313,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"12","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","default_image_id":71799,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[12,14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2407","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2407","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2407"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2407\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/313"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2407"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2407"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2407"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}