During Monday night’s Minden City Council meeting, there was one item which was rapidly approved with very little discussion.
However, this action made by the council speaks volumes about its concerns regarding the citizens of Minden.
The City Council had the opportunity to roll forward Minden’s ad valorem property tax rate. By law, no entity can collect more money in a given year over a previous year without taking action to do so.
So when property assessments go up, or the population increases, taxing bodies must either roll forward the text rate to collect the additional dollars or they decide to keep the dollar amount the same, effectively lowering the property tax rate.
The latter is exactly what the council did Monday night.
With the citizens of Minden facing higher utility bills, this action, while small, helps alleviate some of that.
“This just sets the taxes at the same thing they have been in the past,” Mayor Tommy Davis told the council when the ordinance was introduced.
Politically speaking, some of the Council and the mayor are not running for reelection. It would’ve been easy for some to roll forward the tax rate and collect more money with no fear of political repercussions.
Instead, the council did what they felt was in the best interest of the citizens and their budgets.
The City Council is to be commended for this action. We are all very quick to point out things we don’t like with regard to government. Here’s one instance where we can point out what they did right.
David Specht Jr. is editor and publisher of the Minden Press-Herald.