The Commerce City Council expects to pass a $24 million budget Monday night that includes a property tax increase and minor hikes in both natural gas and electric rates.
The council meets at 6:30 p.m. in the Commerce Room of the Commerce Civic Center.
Approval of the spending plan, which is $1 million lower than the current budget, would complete a long and arduous process — the most difficult budget in recent city history.
The budget calls for $603,787 in property tax revenue, an increase of $247,500 over the current budget, but what remains to be seen is how it affects the millage rate. The council has estimated the tax hike at 1.5 mills, but city manager Clarence Bryant offered the opinion at Monday night’s council work session that, “I’d be very surprised if it’s going to be more than 1.35.”
The budget also includes utility rate increases.
The electric rate increase comprises a “power cost adjustment” done annually and a change in the “environmental charge” reflecting the cost of environmental protection measures at Municipal Electric Authority of Georgia power plants.
The changes would add $1.02 per month to the bill of a customer using 500 kilowatt hours and $2.04 to the bill of a customer using 1,000 kwh.
“Sixty percent of our customers use 700 kwh or less,” Bryant told the council.
And while the city plans to raise its per-unit cost of natural gas by 25 cents to $3.50 per 1,000 cubic feet and its base residential charge by $1.50 a month, Bryant predicted that Commerce gas customers may wind up with lower overall rates this winter than last.
That’s because of the glut of natural gas driving prices down at the wellhead.
“The spot market gas is now a little over $2, but even with this increase, you could sell gas cheaper this (winter) than it was this year,” Bryant said.
Bryant also said the cost of gas — and thus what city customers pay — stands to fall significantly within two years when a Municipal Gas Association of Georgia contract locked into higher prices expires.
Standing Pat On Oconee Pointe
Also on the agenda for Monday night is a request from Northeast Georgia Bank to deed about 20 acres of greenspace in the Oconee Pointe subdivision to the city. The consensus at Monday’s work session was to decline the offer.
Under an agreement reached between the bank and homeowners at Oconee Pointe, the bank agreed to dedicate five lots near the entrance for greenspace in exchange for the right to sell five others for development; and to swap a new parcel of land to be greenspace for a tract that had been previously earmarked for greenspace. As part of the agreement, the residents of the subdivision were to form a homeowners’ association and take title of the greenspace.
The homeowners have not followed through, and the bank has a buyer for an adjacent tract and needs to “wrap everything up at one time,” according to Mayor Clark Hill.
The council expressed the view that accepting the greenspace — thus relieving the homeowners of a small tax liability and the maintenance of the property — would set a precedent.
“I don’t want to set us up for a situation… where somebody develops property and they set up greenspace (required by the city’s subdivision ordinance) and tell us ‘here it is,’” the mayor remarked.
Also on Monday, June 11, the council will consider an application from K & Z Cstore (formerly Jackson Food Mart) for a license to sell beer and wine by the package. The request reflects an ownership change.
