School Boards Playing Games
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Dear Editor,
GREED!!! In August 2022, the Belleville School Board and Administration indicated that they planned to offset the Operational Referendum cost by pre-paying less of the 2016 referendum debt (even creating brochures to that effect)...but what is actually happening behind the scenes? Over the last few years, the Belleville School District has been pre-paying record amounts of debt. In 2019 their debt payment was $716,825, but in 2023 their payment will be a mind blowing $2,752,631 (that is an incredible 284% increase). This action took advantage of the steady increase of home value assessments, kept the Mill Rate artificially high, and, with the addition of a Splash Pad tax, raised the overall tax levy during that time period from $5,865,867 to $8,041,214. When it became clear that the home value assessments of 2022-2023 would allow them to make a yet another record debt pre-payment AND have the Mill Rate decrease, they changed their brochures and decided to gouge the citizens. They could have easily offset the Operational Referendum costs, but they CHOSE not to.
Across the state, many districts had the same situation and chose not to gouge their communities in that way. While overall taxation has increased, the rapid increase in home value assessments has resulted in the state-wide Mill Rate dropping to $7.68 (Belleville is still at $9.96 which is almost 30% higher). This resulted in Belleville being called out on the front page of the Wisconsin State Journal for having the highest adjusted property taxes in Dane County. New Glarus, whose board recently wrote a legally questionable Letter to the Editor (lawyers strongly discourage speaking as a board rather than as private citizens), has been playing the exact same game.
The Mill Rate is a propaganda tool, and does not mean anything to taxpayers. These school districts very much knew that they were doing (significantly raising our taxes through any means available), and they LIED TO US THE ENTIRE TIME!
Joshua Russow,
Belleville
