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The Minot City Council approved a nearly $200 million budget on Monday that likely will result in some tax increase for many property owners.
Details of the final budget were still being calculated, but the proposed budget included a property tax increase of $2.84 for every $100,000 in home valuation - or about $9 a year on a $300,000 home. The property-tax request is expected to be about $28 million.
The budget also creates a $2 a month residential utility fee and $4 a month commercial utility fee for flood control maintenance. It would help pay for four maintenance employees for the flood protection project.
"I'm really disappointed in this body," said Scott Samuelson, who was among residents who had appeared at a public budget hearing to ask the council to reduce taxes. "I truly believe that you’re not listening."
He said six residents spoke against the preliminary budget and none spoke for it, yet the council's amendments only increased the overall spending.
Minot resident John MacMartin apologized for missing the public hearing in voicing his support for the proposed budget.
"We didn't get ahead in this community and be able to grow to over 50,000 population by sticking our head in the sand and not trying to make improvements," he said. "The things that we do to make our community better make a difference."
Minot resident Mike Blessum said he applauded the council's decision to not immediately find a way to spend the savings in the budget resulting from employee health insurance costs coming in lower than expected.
However, he added, "Leaving it in the account for future spending means that it’s still taking that from people whose money it actually is. So, I wish you had taken that next step, which is to direct the city manager to figure out how to reduce the budget itself and reduce the mills that are coming out of our pockets, because it’s not your money to spend. It's our money."
Council members explained that months of work went into drafting the budget proposal, including looking for ways to keep taxes down.
"Everybody would like to have the absolute best services possible and not pay anything for them. But it doesn’t work that way," council member Scott Burlingame said. "If we want good streets, we're going to need to continue to invest in them. As we heard tonight, if we want clean water, we're going to need to continue to invest in them. If we want our firefighters and our first responders and our police to come when we need them, we're going to need to invest in them."