County Council Candidates Answer Questions On Taxes, Budgets
County Council Candidates Answer Questions On Taxes, Budgets
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David Slone-dslone@timesuniononline.com
County Council Candidates Answer Questions On Taxes, BudgetsThree candidates are vying for the Republican nomination for the District 3 seat on the Kosciusko County Council, while two are hoping to capture the District 1 nomination in Tuesday’s election primary.
All five participated in the second night of the 2022 Candidate Forum Wednesday evening, responding to seven questions. The forum was organized through a partnership of the Kosciusko Chamber of Commerce, Kensington Media, Times-Union and InkFree News.
The District 1 candidates are incumbent Kimberly Cates and Todd Davis, while the District 3 contenders are Josh Lozano, Scott Clay and Tony Ciriello. The current District 3 councilman is Ernie Wiggins who chose not to seek re-election.
As the Council is the “purse strings” of the county, a number of questions related to budgeting and taxes. The first was: In 2021, during the budgeting process for 2022, the County Commissioners wanted to increase their legal services budget to $131,000, but the County Council only approved a 4% increase to $60,320. The candidates were asked to explain why they agreed or disagreed with the Council’s decision.
Lozano did not have an answer to the question, while Clay said he was “completely fine” with the 4% increase and the county didn’t need to invest more into its legal services at this time.
Davis said, “I don’t know that anybody who wasn’t in those discussions can have a good perspective, so, not having been there, I don’t have a good perspective on it.” What he said he could say was that we lived in a very litigious society and it wouldn’t be uncommon that the legal services budget would need increased in due time.
Ciriello said that the legal fees the Commissioners asked for, for their attorney, does seem a little outrageous when you look at the numbers themselves. But, he said, agreeing with Davis, we live in a litigious society where everyone is suing for everything.
Cates, who helped make that decision on the budget in 2021, said the Council disagrees with some department budgets when they come before the Council.
“What happens is, if there’s a line item that seems either inconsistent or excessive, we basically have to question it. And I think that, in hindsight and going forward, we will still continue to do that because that’s our job. We have to be due diligent and just earmarking that, asking the right questions,” she said.
Earlier this year, Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb signed a $1.1 billion tax cut package, which could reduce Indiana’s income tax rate from 3.23% to 2.9% over seven years. Also, it is likely the Business Personal Property (BPP) tax will be eliminated next year. The candidates were asked if they supported these two actions and what impact would it have upon the county?
Clay said he would support looking at reducing Indiana’s income tax rate as that would be a great thing for county residents. However, he said he hadn’t had the time to investigate the BPP tax elimination and didn’t have an answer at this time.
Davis agreed with Clay that any chance to reduce the tax rate was the right thing to do. Florida doesn’t have an income tax rate, he said, and seems to be doing fine without it. He asked if it was enough of a reduction.
As for the BPP tax elimination, Davis said that would come right out of the county’s budget so that’s a “bit problematic” and would be something the county would need to look at.
Ciriello said that like everyone else, “we all want to pay less taxes” and the tax cut will make a little bit of a difference in everyone’s pockets, but also will make a difference in the money the county receives.
The BPP tax was one of the big things down at the Statehouse this year, Ciriello said. While the BPP tax was eliminated from the tax cut bill, he said the fiscal impact it would have had on most counties in Indiana would have been pretty significant. Holcomb wants the BPP tax elimination, Ciriello said, so it probably will return to the General Assembly in 2023.
Cates agreed that everyone wants their taxes to be less, but the state does have astute legislators that listen to the community. “They were able to keep that Business Personal Property tax intact,” she said. “Just to give you an example of how it affects us directly, in our budget, Business Personal Property tax affects our budget 14%. So if we look at a 14% decrease in our funding from our resources that we have that are existing, that’s a pretty big hit. There are some counties that will be hit up to 44% of their resources and their income to the county.”
If the state is going to take away that funding, Cates said the state needs to find another resource to replace that money because the county can’t take a 14% hit in its revenues.
Lozano said with the BPP tax elimination, the county would be hit pretty hard and it would need to be offset at some level.
Another question asked the candidates about the condition of the county roads and road funding.
Davis said roads was the one question that comes up routinely when he goes out and meets people while campaigning. He said he knows the county’s plan is to be able to repave 120 miles of roads on an annual basis, or 10% of the county’s roads.
“That just may not be enough. We instituted a Wheel Tax a few years ago. That didn’t go over real well with the people who were now having to pay a new tax, but it was necessary. If we’re going to go back to the state and ask for more, our tax dollars to come back to Kosciusko County, we have to use all the resources we have at our disposal and the Wheel Tax was something they did give us to bring in that revenue,” Davis said.
It’s an issue the county may need to take a look at because touching a road once every 10 years may not be enough, he said.
Ciriello said some of the roads in the county are good, while others are in pretty bad shape, but the majority of them are in pretty good shape.
Cates said there are multiple reasons and multiple funding sources for the roads. Besides the Wheel Tax, she pointed out the county receives Motor Vehicle Highway funds, but those funds that come back from Indianapolis are restricted. “So we have restrictions on our MVH funding and it’s a priority of our county to either eliminate the restriction or lessen the restriction. We have an account in our budget that’s almost a million dollars that we don’t spend because we’re challenged because of legislative restrictions,” she said.
The state also has recalculated gas tax funding so the state gets more of the percentage and the counties get less, Cates pointed out.
Lozano said the roads are a big issue and are a reoccurring thing that the county can’t pour a ton of money into once and hope it all goes away. He said the county needs to tackle as much of the roads as it can a year.
Clay said that while the Wheel Tax was another thing that people had to pay, it still helps provide for having great roads. He said all the county roads are grades A-F so the county knows which ones need to be fixed first. He agreed with Cates that the county needs to work with the state to reduce the limits on the MVH fund.
On if they supported a county park board, all the candidates said yes. They also agreed that while they aren’t huge fans of tax abatements, sometimes they’re a useful economic development tool. Cates pointed out the county only has one abatement at this time.
