Wilmington City Council passes a budget for the next fiscal year, but only after some testy debate over property taxes.
Before passing the budget, Wilmington City Council had to pass a property tax rate for the upcoming fiscal year - adjusted for new reassessed property values.
While council passed a rate of $3.74 per $1,000 of assessed value for residential properties and $5.83 for nonresidential properties, there was plenty of discussion getting to that point.
Everyone agreed there are issues with where the recent court-ordered property reassessments landed, but there was disagreement on how to move forward.
Councilman Coby Owens voted against the tax rates.
"While we may not be increasing their tax rate, people's taxes are going up, and I again, I want to thank the council chairwoman and the mayor's administration for trying to do the best thing, but this is not it. By accepting this, you're validating a flawed system," said Owens.
Council President Trippi Congo also voted against the tax rates.
“Something just doesn't sit right with me, being that Tyler Technologies got Wilmington wrong and one of the only major cities in the state that they got wrong, and it's a minority majority city,” said Congo. “It just seemed like there is just something evil about what happened. So, it’s really hard for me to co-sign on it.”
The rates passed 8-5 with most voting for them mainly because they otherwise couldn’t pass a budget.
Councilman Chris Johnson says the $201.7 million budget wasn’t perfect, but it did align with council priorities.
"This one enhances our neighborhoods, enhances our senior home repair program, enhances our parks. Every single investment is towards the City of Wilmington and stabilizing our neighborhoods diversity efforts. Everything is hit. So it builds on what we did previously, and it builds on top of it," said Johnson.
Projected revenues leave the city at a surplus of more than $2.5 million for the upcoming fiscal year.
The budget passed by a 12-1 vote with Council President Trippi Congo being the lone no, but that’s customary for Congo and city budgets as he usually votes against them.
The budget has to be passed 30 days prior to the fiscal year starting by law, and that’s why Wilmington City Council took up the budget towards the end of this month.
