New Gage County budget reduces tax request, for second straight year

BEATRICE – The Gage County Board Wednesday approved a new budget of just under $48.5 million…which has a tax request lower than the past year’s plan.
"That equates to about a six percent decrease. Last year, from '21 to '22...that was about a seven percent decrease. So, if we go back a year, we were about seven percent down. This year, we're about an additional six percent down."

Supervisors Chairman Erich Tiemann said elected officials and their departments have done a good job holding down spending. The overall budget is less than one percent higher than the past year.  Property valuation went up significantly in Gage County this year…roughly 10%.

Tiemann said some of the decrease in taxes is due to the huge civil rights judgment being paid off… frugality of county offices…staff adjustments and efficiencies.

"Now, inflation is going up...the cost of living is going up. We can't realistically always be cutting things back. But I think the county's done a very good job over the last multiple years at running as frugally as possible and trying to be efficient."

The county tax rate for general operations, under the plan, is nearly 29.34 cents per hundred dollars of valuation….a drop from last year’s 34.16 cents. Adding in allowable tax funding for townships, fire districts and the like….the total county tax rate is about 40.28 cents.

When the county was paying a huge civil rights judgment, the total levy was required to be at the cap of 50-cents, under a state law that allowed the county to use a special half-cent countywide sales tax to help pay the judgment. Board member Terry Jurgens is finance chairman for the board. "It's unusual that you'll see a board decrease their spending. But, we've done this now, for two years in a row. We understand the pressure on the taxpayers out there. It's a small part of it, but we're trying to do our part to keep everything as minimal as possible."

The property tax request for county general operations decreased by about $720,000……to a total of about $11.05 million. The largest expenses for the county are in roads, sheriff’s and corrections services. The county’s fiscal year begins July 1st.