Port Tax Bill Down, Saukville's Up in Approved School Budget

Despite decreases in state aid, the Board on Monday night approved a balanced budget with an overall lower tax rate.

The total tax levy went from $14,322,608 in the 2010-11 school year to $14,175,244 for 2011-12, a decrease of about 1 percent, Director of Business Services Jim Froemming said. That levy equals a mill rate of $9.37 per $1,000 of assesed property value, down from $9.44 last year.

"It wasn't one thing that got us there, or didn't get us there, that may have happened in other districts — it was a combination," Froemming said.

Even though the overall amount being paid to the district through taxes is lower, different municipalities will feel the crunch in different ways because of varying market values.

School district tax levies are based on equalized values — or fair market values — as determined by the state for each municipality, Port Washington City Administrator Mark Grams said. This is different from city tax levies, which are based on the city's assessed value.

In Port Washington, the assessed value is up because of a number of new homes, Grams said, but Froemming said the equalized values are down by .93 percent. In the village as well as the town of Saukville, equalized values are both up, by 1 percent and 3.07 percent, respectively.

Taking a home valued at $175,000, city of Port residents would pay $27.62 less to the schools on this tax bill, while village of Saukville residents with that house value would pay $3.99 more and town of Saukville residents would pay $37.97 more.

School officials faced an 8.5 percent decrease in revenue per pupil, equal to about $1.5 million, under Gov. Scott Walker's budget. Most years, the district received about a 3 percent increase in that aid. Because of these cuts, the district — and was able to do so without making drastic cuts.

The total budget for the 2011-12 school year is $28,590,139, down 3.7 percent from last year.

"(The) numbers just seem to have come together the same way we anticipated … despite all the challenges," School Board member Jim Olson said. "Kudos to the staff for making it work."

While several other county school districts are not yet at the point of approving the 2011-12 school budgets, Froemming said it's important to remember the vast differences between districts.

"Each district has a different set of cards they’re playing with, and sometimes people think they’re operating with the same deck and they aren’t — so sometimes they make assumptions and it gets messed up," he said.

In the Port Washington-Saukville School District, the total tax levy per student sits at $5,303, down from $5,332 in 2010-11 — and much lower than other county schools.

"If we’re talking about our (residents), they’re getting a very big value for the education within the district," Froemming said.