July 8, 2005 Trust, but verify! Saving Taxpayers $1.2 Million

"Trust, but verify."


We had a Budget Committee meeting yesterday, July 7. Commissioners got work packets and financial data to prepare for the meeting on July 5. In our work packets, the state had reported a new countywide certified tax rate of $1.95. The Trustee had taken this new tax rate and had run new revenue calculations. The Finance Director had prepared a new budget summary using the new rate and revenue calculations. BUT...

Fortunately, the packet included the worksheet showing how the new tax rate of $1.95 had been calculated by the state. I looked at the state's calculation of the new rate and immediately spotted a problem. A wrong number had been plugged in to the calculation. The rate had been miscalculated and appeared to be too high by 11 cents.

I called the Assessor who immediately called Nashville and within a short time we had a new LOWER tax rate of $1.84. Anybody can make a mistake. As the old saying goes, "Trust, but verify." That's the only way to be accountable and take care of tax dollars. In this case, a simple review of the figures resulted in a savings to county taxpayers on their tax bills of close to $1.2 million dollars.

The Assessor, Trustee, and Finance Director handed out corrected information on the tax rate, revenues, and budget summary, and the Committee discussed the 06 budget briefly. There was some good financial news presented at the meeting. Our worker's compensation premiums have gone down significantly.

Since 05 closed out on June 30, I asked that the Trustee and County Mayor/Finance Director provide updated 05 revenue and expenditure reports before we proceed further with budget deliberations. It will be helpful to get a final, more accurate picture of revenues and expenses of the year just completed before we finalize a spending plan and set a tax rate for the next year. These officials agreed to provide the 05 figures before we meet again on Wednesday, July 13.

I also brought up Metro, joint city-county government. I keep hearing commissioners and residents say it's time to look in to this, but we haven't taken any concrete step toward exploring this. Several commissioners said that they think the City of Morristown will resist any move toward Metro. I certainly hope there won't be any knee-jerk opposition to Metro. Geographically, Hamblen is the third smallest county in Tennessee, and there is only one city in the county. We are an ideal candidate for a Metropolitan form of government. It's a proposal that deserves full and fair consideration. There has been way too much city-county bickering in the past.

More on the Budget and Metro to come....