Update
The Franklin Village Council approved a resolution on July 11, 2022 to put a proposal on the November 8th ballot to double the tax rate to 5mills. This was illegal and was walked back, and now they seek the maximum allowable millage of 3.5 mills…BUT somehow this is missing from the meeting minutes.
The Open Meetings Act requires all decisions made by council be documented in the minutes. It was documented in the draft minutes found in the council packet Packet, but was removed from the released meeting minutes Minutes.
This is a clear violation of the law and most likely was not a simple oversight but was meant to:
- Remove the stigma of having no knowledge of the law and passing illegal resolutions
- Hide the fact that they attempted to double taxes
- Avoid questions
- Avoid documenting illegal behavior
Why is the village so desperate to raise our taxes?
Desperate enough to break the law proposing it, break the law trying to cover up for breaking the law…probably.
These politicians have zero shame and after finding out their resolution was illegal they immediately requested the maximum level allowed by the law. Then they mischaracterize this as the value “authorized by the charter”, um no it is the maximum allowed!
Why would they Illegally try to raise them WAY above what is needed?
2.5 added mills over 15 years is well over 13 million dollars!!! What in the world are they planning with all that money?
Why were there NO CONSIDERATIONS for reductions in expenses?
The first response of politicians should not be to stick their hands out for more when tax and state revenues are up 18.4%.
Thanks to the law we are limited to a 37% tax increase. If we could get these politicians to work on controlling costs as hard as they do promoting tax increases, I’m sure the budget issues would be solved. Unfortunately they are focused on expanding government and raising taxes.
Original
Our Village Council recently voted on a resolution to request doubling our general tax rate. This is not only illegal, but is a terrible idea which would create a slush fund for pet projects that would not require any oversight from residents.
Thankfully it did not make it on the ballot, because the illegality was brought up to the council, but residents need to take a look at what is going on and how recklessly our officials spend our tax dollars.
Legal Issues
1. A General Tax Rate > 3.5mills is Illegal
The Village of Franklin’s Charter limits the amount of general taxes the government can levy on us to 3.5%!
This does authorize an additional 1.5mills exclusively for fire protection services…but this is not what the council was asking for. They wanted to double the general tax to pay for overspending, to 5mills as shown below.
2. It is Illegal to Run a Deficit Budget
Our Village Council is prohibited from running a budget with expenses exceeding revenues.
They are attempting to work around this by transferring money…but transfer of money is NOT revenue, so this is also illegal.
Other Concerns
If we ignore the fact that this is illegal, and a resolution like this violating the charter should never even have been passed there are still valid reasons we as voters should not approve such a measure.
1. The Request is WAY HIGHER than Required
It is clear our council has not been responsible stewards of our tax dollars and have been spending more money than they take in, so I completely understand why a tax increase is needed, but the amount and reasoning given by them makes no sense.
- Add ~1 mill to cover deficit spending bringing the rate to 3.5mills
- Add 1.5 mills to build the funds back to the level they should be at
The first point I can understand the council needs to make more revenue to cover their irresponsible spending. The second is a just crazy especially since this council has a history of asking for more money than is needed and then using it for purposes other than what it was approved for.
The second point is they want to restore fund balances by ~700k, but they are asking us to give them ~600k extra per year building a slush fund of 5.3Million over 10 years.
2. VC has a History of Asking for More Money than Needed to Fund Pet Projects without Oversight
What did our Council tell us about this extra 2 million used for Lighting and the Streetscape?
- They saved over two million by being fiscally responsible and having excellent project management controlling costs
That was a lie. The maximum contract was 11.8 million, never 14.5million as documented to the left, but they borrowed 2.7 Million more than needed to fund future projects!!!
3. VC Spends Money Recklessly & Illegally
While illegally running the government in a deficit, they approved raises, new positions, funding for many items, just a small sampling is below.
- Increased funding of MSF to $20,000
- A expensive PR firm $43592/yr1
- Includes $4410 or more for PR for summer block party
- Admin budget increased by $184,590
- Includes $74,700 for MSF Economic Dir
- Study for sidewalks along 13 mile new funding $25,0002
- Water Study new funding $25,0002
Footnotes
- PR firm retainer was $2,500/month, value shown was average cost from monthly bills lists in available council packets.
- Mark Hanke, the self proclaimed financial expert added two items totaling $50,000 at the last minute, even though the budget already illegally had expenses > revenue.
Franklin Villagers 